Capricious Caroline Part 26

It made her heart ache sharply to see the pitiful eagerness with which Camilla did her bidding.

When the mother came back again she had divested herself of her silk underskirt, so that there should be as little noise as possible.

"Give me Betty," she whispered; then she pushed Caroline gently on one side. "I can lift her myself," she said, "I have done it before."

She almost staggered under the burden of the sleeping child as she took it out of the bed; but the colour came back to her face, and her eyes lost that wild look as she held Betty to her heart.

Caroline tucked a cot blanket securely about the little feet, and went down closely behind.

"Now I will bring Baby," she whispered.

Both journeys were accomplished satisfactorily; neither child woke, though Baby for a moment opened her sleepy eyes as though she would have questioned what was pa.s.sing with her.

When they were both laid in Camilla's luxurious bed (and by the sound of their breathing the two listeners had a.s.sured themselves that the rest was unbroken) the mother went up to Caroline and kissed her, and then she put her arms round the girl and clung to her.

"Don't think me mad," she said hoa.r.s.ely; "to-morrow I will tell you all."

"You are so cold," said Caroline, unevenly; "won't you have something?

Let me get you a little brandy?"

"It is you who ought to be cold," said Camilla; "how selfish I am, dragging you out of your bed like this."

They spoke in hushed tones.

"I am not a bit cold," Caroline said.

Indeed, she had found time to slip on something about her shoulders, though her feet were bare.

She insisted upon putting Mrs. Lancing in the chair in front of the fire, and then she went down to the dining-room and brought back a little brandy.

Camilla thanked her with a wan smile, and urged the girl a second time to go back to her bed. But Caroline would not leave her at once.

She was a little alarmed at Mrs. Lancing's look, and she knelt down, chafing first the cold, slender hands, and then the small, cold feet.

"It is a long time since I carried Betty," Camilla said after a little while. "Dear heart, she has grown so much she is no longer a baby, alas! alas!"

The stimulant had already commenced to put a little sign of warmth and life into her; the misery in her expression was breaking a little.

"She was my first baby, you know," she said, "and her father thought her the most wonderful thing in the world. He used to walk up and down with her for hours at a time, and the old nurse I had was _so_ angry with him!... She said it was such a bad habit. But I loved to see him with that little creature in his arms; he was so gentle with it.... And then to think that he could forget her, turn away and leave her!... It does not seem so bad that he should have forgotten me," she said. She spoke dreamily.

There was a long pause. Caroline still chafed the small feet.

"You wonder, perhaps, why I asked for Betty," Camilla said in a low voice. "I love them both just the same, but Betty belonged to the beginning. Her father never saw Baby; poor little Baby! I wonder would he have stayed if he had seen her?"

"You are warm now," said Caroline, brightly; "do let me help you into bed. You will feel so much better there, and the children will keep you warm. Won't they be surprised when they wake up and find themselves in your bed?"

The smile that came into Mrs. Lancing's eyes was very pleasant to the girl kneeling beside her to see.

Her heart began to beat a little less nervously. The fear and the uneasiness began to slip from her. When she would have got up Camilla held her back a moment.

"You have been so good to me," she said in a broken way, "and you give me such a sense of strength, of comfort. How angry nurse would have been if I had disturbed her as I have disturbed you! Dennis is right. I have never had any one about me like you before."

Caroline smiled. There was a great sweetness in her face.

To the woman looking at her she had still that spiritual touch about her, and yet she was human, human in the most exquisite meaning of the word.

"Do let me help you to undress.... I am sure you ought to be in bed,"

she urged.

She got her way, and a little later, after she had tended Camilla as if she had been a tired child, she stood and looked at the mother nestling down in the bed between those two small slumbering forms, and the sight brought tears to her eyes.

"I am going to stay a little while in case you want me," she whispered.

Camilla heard her as in a dream.

The hot agony had pa.s.sed from her heart and a sense of exhaustion fell upon her; she lay with a hand touching each of her children, and Caroline moved about the room softly, putting it tidy.

She picked up the lace gown from the floor; she laid it and the magnificent wrap on the couch.

The fire lit up the room with a warm, ruddy glow. Caroline put some more coals on noiselessly. By the firelight she saw the scattered jewels and gathered them together; then she put the letters in a pile, with Colonel Lancing's at the bottom.

When all was done she paused and listened quite a long time.

Mrs. Lancing never moved; she had fallen asleep.

"Poor creature!" said Caroline to herself.

She stole softly away, but the room upstairs had such a desolate look, she could not stay in it; so, as sleep was impossible now, she dressed quickly, and went back to Mrs. Lancing's room still in the same soft way.

"I may be of some use," she said.

She sat in the chair by the fire and she watched the bed. It gave her a sense of extraordinary gladness to see those three so closely together; in this moment she seemed to share in their union; she ceased to be a stranger.

CHAPTER IX

Although he had both telegraphed and written to ask for some statement concerning Caroline Graniger from his mother, Rupert Haverford, of course, never expected to receive a prompt answer; indeed, he was quite prepared to have no answer at all.

He left orders that all his letters were to be forwarded to him whilst he was in the north, and Caroline's little epistle travelled thither with the rest of his enormous correspondence.

It would have been very difficult for Haverford to have described why he objected to the arrangement that had been entered into between Mrs.

Lancing and Caroline Graniger. The girl's own argument to herself in favour of what she had done was a very sound one. Indeed, under the circ.u.mstances, most people would have regarded the matter as being both lucky and satisfactory.

But Rupert shared Mrs. Brenton's view about things done in haste; that for the first point; the second was that, as he had put himself out in a certain measure to make arrangements for Miss Graniger, he considered that he should have been consulted before she had made any definite plans.