'Ask himself, Hetta.'
'And you will tell me nothing? You will not try to save me though you know that I am in danger? Who is--Mrs Hurtle?'
'Have you asked him?'
'I had not heard her name when he parted from me. I did not even know that such a woman lived. Is it true that he has promised to marry her? Felix told me of her, and told me also that you knew. But I cannot trust Felix as I would trust you. And mamma says that it is so;--but mamma also bids me ask you. There is such a woman?'
'There is such a woman certainly.'
'And she has been,--a friend of Paul's?'
'Whatever be the story, Hetta, you shall not hear it from me. I will say neither evil nor good of the man except in regard to his conduct to myself. Send for him and ask him to tell you the story of Mrs Hurtle as it concerns himself. I do not think he will lie, but if he lies you will know that he is lying.'
'And that is all?'
'All that I can say, Hetta. You ask me to be your brother;--but I cannot put myself in the place of your brother. I tell you plainly that I am your lover, and shall remain so. Your brother would welcome the man whom you would choose as your husband. I can never welcome any husband of yours. I think if twenty years were to pass over us, and you were still Hetta Carbury, I should still be your lover,--though an old one. What is now to be done about Felix, Hetta?'
'Ah what can be done? I think sometimes that it will break mamma's heart.'
'Your mother makes me angry by her continual indulgence.'
'But what can she do? You would not have her turn him into the street?'
'I do not know that I would not. For a time it might serve him perhaps. Here is the cab. Here they are. Yes; you had better go down and let your mother know that I am here. They will perhaps take him up to bed, so that I need not see him.'
Hetta did as she was bid, and met her mother and her brother in the hall. Felix having the full use of his arms and legs was able to descend from the cab, and hurry across the pavement into the house, and then, without speaking a word to his sister, hid himself in the dining-room. His face was strapped up with plaister so that not a feature was visible; and both his eyes were swollen and blue; part of his beard had been cut away, and his physiognomy had altogether been so treated that even the page would hardly have known him. 'Roger is upstairs, mamma,' said Hetta in the hall.