Lizzie stared, broke into a silly triumphant laugh, and thrust the child forward against the carriage-step. The poor waif, drenched, dazed, tottering without his crutch, caught at the plated handle for support. Honoria gazed down on him with eyes which took slow and pitiless account of the deformed little body, the shrunken, puny limbs.
"Thank you. So—this—is what my husband died for. Drive on, please."
Her eyes, as she lifted them to give the order, rested for a moment on Taffy—with how much scorn he cared not, could he have leapt and intercepted Lizzie's retort.
"And why not? A son's a son—curse you!—though he was your man!"
It seemed she did not hear; or hearing, did not understand. Her eyes hardened; their fire on Taffy and he, lapped in their scorn, thanked God she had not understood.
"Drive on, please."
The coachman lowered his whip. The horses moved forward at a slow walk; the carriage rolled silently away into the darkness. She had not understood. Taffy glanced at the faces about him.
"Ah, poor lady!" said someone. But no one had understood.
They found George's body next morning on the sands a little below the footbridge. He lay there in the morning sunshine as though asleep, with an arm flung above his head and on his face the easy smile for which men and women had liked him throughout his careless life.