“Does it relieve your anxiety?”
It told me that I had not surprised her. That unforgotten Vision of the night had prepared her for the worst, after the time when I had told her that she was an adopted child. “I know,” I said, “that those whispered temptations overpowered you again, when you and Helena met on the stairs, and you forbade her to enter Philip’s room. And I know that love had conquered once more, when you were next seen sitting by Philip’s bedside. Tell me—have you any misgivings now? Is there fear in your heart of the return of that tempting spirit in you, in the time to come?”
“Not while Philip lives!”
There, where her love was—there her safety was. And she knew it! She suddenly left me. I asked where she was going.
“To tell Philip,” was the reply.
She was waiting for me at the door, when I followed her to the house.
“Is it done?” I said.
“It is done,” she answered.
“What did he say?”
“He said: ‘My darling, if I could be fonder of you than ever, I should be fonder of you now.’”