“I don't know how Andrew brought things up,” she said, very short of breath, but not so much so but she could fire this little shot. “I suppose they are all at sixes and sevens. But I wasn't able to do any....”
“If you are not well, you had better go to bed,” said the priest quite sharply. “Andrew will do all I want done.”
Taken unawares by this unusual severity, Jane lost her discretion. “It is my place to look that things are properly done in the house, and I shall do it,” she said, half defiant, half hysterical, and took a step nearer to the table.
As she did so, her eyes fell on the pale and haggard face of their guest. At that sight she paused, transfixed with a genuine astonishment, for she had expected to see F. O'Donovan; and, after one wild glance, as if she had seen a ghost, uttered a cry and covered her face with her hands.
“Jane!” exclaimed the priest in a voice that told her he was not to be tried much further. “Have you lost your senses?”
“My heart is broken for Mrs. Gerald!” she cried, weeping loudly. “I haven't been able to stand hardly since I heard about her. Oh! such a wicked world as this is. I shall be glad when the Lord takes me out of it. To think that I shall never see her again, that....”
F. Chevreuse laid down his knife and fork, which he had made a pretence of using. “You and Mrs. Gerald were by no means such intimate friends that her death should plunge you in this great affliction,” he said. “Her nearest friends bear their sorrow with fortitude. Your agitation is therefore quite uncalled for. I have no further need of you to-night. If you want anything done for you, Andrew will go for some of your friends.”
There was no possibility of resisting this intimation, and the housekeeper retired speechless with rage and mortification.
“Mr. Schöninger,” remarked the [pg 496] priest gravely, when they were alone, “women are sometimes very troublesome.”
“F. Chevreuse,” returned his visitor with equal gravity, “men are sometimes very troublesome.”