Like all delightful things, Mrs. Nevill Tyson's laughter was short-lived.
When Tyson went up to bed that night between twelve and one, he found his
wife sitting by her bedroom fire in the half-darkness. Evidently
contemplation had overtaken her in the act of undressing, for her hair
was still untouched, her silk bodice lay beside her on the floor where
she had let it fall, and she sat robed in her long dressing-gown. He came
up to her, holding his candle so that the light fell full on her face; it
looked strange and pale against the vivid scarlet of her gown. Her eyes,
too, were dim, her mouth had lost its delicate outline, her cheeks seemed
to have grown slightly, ever so slightly, fuller, and the skin looked
glazed as if by the courses of many tears. He had noticed these changes
before; of late they had come many times in the twelve hours; but
to-night it seemed not so much a momentary disfigurement as a sudden
precocious maturity, as if nature had stamped her face with the image of
what it would be ten, fifteen years hence. And as he looked at her a cold
and subtle pang went through him, a curious abominable sensation, mingled
with a sort of spiritual pain. He dared not give a name to the one
feeling, but the other he easily recognized as self-reproach. He had
known it once or twice before.
He stooped over her and kissed her. "Why are you sitting up here and
crying, all by your little self?"
She shook her head.
"What are you crying about? You didn't suppose I was angry with you?"
"No. I wouldn't have cried if you had been angry. I'm not crying now.
I don't know why I cried at all. I'm tired, or cold, or something."
"Why don't you go to bed, then?"
"I'm going." She rose wearily and went to the dressing-table. He watched
her reflection in the looking-glass. As she raised her arms to take the
pins from her hair, her white face grew whiter, it was deadly white. He
went to her help, unpinning the black coils, smoothing them and plaiting
them in a loose braid. He did it in a business-like way, as if he had
been a hairdresser, he whose pulse used to beat faster if he so much as
touched her gown. Then he gave her a cold business-like kiss that left
her sadder than before. The fact was, he had thought she was going to
faint. But Mrs. Nevill Tyson was not of the fainting kind; she was only
tired, tired and sick.
It was arranged that Tyson was to leave by the two o'clock train the next
day. He was packing up his things about noon, when Molly staggered into
his dressing-room with her teeth chattering. Clinging to the rail of the
bedstead for support, she gazed at the preparations for his departure.