“Now you are coming to it!” he cried. “Now I feel sure that I recall correctly the last words the doctor said: ‘If my view is the right one, I should not be surprised to hear that the recovery which we all wish to see had found its beginning in such apparently trifling circumstances as the tone of some other person’s voice or the influence of some other person’s look.’ That plain expression of his opinion only occurred to my memory after I had written my foolish letter of excuse. I spare you the course of other recollections that followed, to come at once to the result. For the first time I have the hope, the faint hope, that the voice which haunts me has been once already controlled by one of the influences of which the doctor spoke—the influence of a look.”
If he had said this to Lady Loring, instead of to her husband, she would have understood him at once. Lord Loring asked for a word more of explanation.
“I told you yesterday,” Romayne answered, “that a dread of the return of the voice had been present to me all the morning, and that I had come to see the picture with an idea of trying if change would relieve me. While I was in the gallery I was free from the dread, and free from the voice. When I returned to the hotel it tortured me—and Mr. Penrose, I grieve to say, saw what I suffered. You and I attributed the remission to the change of scene. I now believe we were both wrong. Where was the change? In seeing you and Lady Loring, I saw the two oldest friends I have. In visiting your gallery, I only revived the familiar associations of hundreds of other visits. To what influence was I really indebted for my respite? Don’t try to dismiss the question by laughing at my morbid fancies. Morbid fancies are realities to a man like me. Remember the doctor’s words, Loring. Think of a new face, seen in your house! Think of a look that searched my heart for the first time!”
Lord Loring glanced once more at the clock on the mantel-piece. The hands pointed to the dinner hour.
“Miss Eyrecourt?” he whispered.
“Yes; Miss Eyrecourt.”
The library door was thrown open by a servant. Stella herself entered the room. [ [!-- H2 anchor --] ]