He was looking exhausted. A pallor appeared beneath his dark skin; his eyes were rather sunken, thus bringing into strange relief his somewhat massively hewn features. A strand of black straight hair fell from the side-parting across his forehead. Lady Phayre, standing with one hand on the back of her chair, regarded him pityingly.
“Have you had anything to eat?”
“Oh, yes; I think so.”
“Tell me when. Ah! I see you haven’t. I’ll order you something in the dining-room.”
“I couldn’t think——” he began; but she interrupted him.
“You must, to please me. I can’t bear to see you so tired. You will feel quite a different man. And a small bottle of champagne.”
Man has not been born of a woman who could have refused Lady Phayre, when she spoke with that coaxing charm.
Goddard’s face softened into assent, and he followed her with his eyes, in a dumb, wondering way, as she went to give the necessary directions.
He had never quite familiarised himself with his surroundings in that room. It always seemed a corner of Paradise that had somehow got left behind upon the unlovely earth. The feeling had never been so strong as at present. With his brain throbbing from the painful emotions of the day, his eyes still dazed by the various scenes—the mean, squalid streets, the grim, closed factories, the poverty-stricken homes, the idle, sullen men lounging at street-corners, the crowd of gaunt, unresponsive faces at the meeting—and with his body exhausted with fatigue and hunger, this warm nest of exquisite peace and comfort was deliciously unreal. Even Moumouth, luxuriously coiled on his velvet cushion, seemed a creature of a different sphere from that of the lean grey cats he had seen darting from doorways across alleys, preceding the appearance of red-shawled women. And the voice of Lady Phayre hummed like far-away music in his ears, and her delicate womanly sympathy was like soft hands against his cheek. It was almost a dream. He leaned forward, elbows on knees, his fingers through his hair. He longed for her to come back, so that he could tell her of the failure. Somehow, it no longer struck him as an ordeal. The magic of her presence had charmed away his repugnance.
She returned, knelt down on the long fender-stool, and spread out her hands before the blaze.