“Thank you very much,” he said, almost as if she had conferred a favour on him personally, “I will think over what you have said; we will try and help her; and may I come again soon?”
Embrance answered that she would be very glad to see him, and when, after a little more chat, he took his leave, she went singing into the next room, feeling lighter of heart than she had done for days. She liked Horace Meade very much, and how pleased Joan would be to hear of his arrival!
Joan was, indeed, delighted to welcome her cousin; Mrs. Rakely invited him to the hotel, and there were many happy days spent in his society. His own rooms and studio were in a distant suburb, but he found time to make himself very agreeable to the ladies, and to show them the sights of London. Joan was in her element, but too soon there came a period of reaction. Mrs. Rakely went back to the country, and Horace began to work regularly; he was slowly making his way as a portrait painter. Joan fell into low spirits again, she wrote a great many letters, and received bulky communications from Mrs. Rakely, about which she maintained a silence, strangely unlike her usual talkativeness. Now and then she would turn wistful glances on Embrance, as if longing for sympathy, but she made no confidences. And Embrance treated her with great tenderness, believing that some slight squabble with Horace was the cause of her despondency. “Better not to worry her with too many questions,” she thought, “she will tell me in her own good time.”
Horace came to the little second floor parlour, generally timing his visits so as to arrive about seven o’clock. He had dined at his club. If he might be allowed, it suited him best to drop in at this time. He hoped he wasn’t in the way. Embrance bade him heartily welcome, while Joan would forget her melancholy, and brighten into fresh beauty under the influence of her cousin’s pleasant talk. More than once Embrance, busy as she was, had attempted to leave the cousins to themselves, while she laboured at a side table; but Horace had a knack of coaxing her back to the fireside, asking her opinion on some interesting topic, or referring to her laughingly as a competent authority. And she had been enticed away to listen to his account of his travels, or description of his housekeeping failures in his own rooms. He set Joan hard at work painting menu cards and photograph frames, saying that he knew a man who would dispose of them at a fair price, and now and then he brought a drawing for her to copy, but he showed no sign of being impressed with the progress that she made.
“Do you expect your cousin this evening?” asked Embrance, one afternoon, about a month after Christmas; “he has not been to see you for some time.”
“No,” said Joan, wearily. She was lying full length on the hearthrug, with her head on a pillow, while Embrance arranged the ornaments on the mantelpiece to her better satisfaction; “but I have heard from him.”
“What did he say?” asked Embrance, fancying that in Joan’s manner she could trace a desire to be further questioned; “is it a secret, Joan, or may I know all about it?”
Joan fixed her great eyes upon Embrance, and raised herself from the ground with one arm: “I have got a secret, but I am not to tell you. Did you guess that I had?”
Embrance nodded. She had finished putting the ornaments to rights, and now came and sat on a low chair by the fire. “You would rather not tell me about it just yet, Joan?”
“Not yet,” said Joan, excitedly. “You will know soon. Mrs. Rakely knows. But, but”—she hesitated, “I don’t know when Horace will come here again; he is very inconsiderate sometimes. What do you think he proposed I should do? I met him one day and asked his advice—you are so busy, Embrance, there seems to be no time to talk to you. He says that I had better go back to Doveton!”