1885.]
scene now, there might be some- thing in that ; and in any case, it would save your carpets. I feel as if there were quicksilver in my veins, and as if the chair- cushions were catapults. Perhaps you may have remarked my restlessness," she added, innocently.
'* I have indeed, my dear ; and so has Adolphe," answered Ma- dame Robineau, so plaintively that Grace again rippled over in laugh- ter. " And I do believe that a few days at the Eaux-Chaudes will do you all the good in the world. I don't mind giving myself a little holiday; and I daresay Adolphe can manage to join us on Monday, and offer us his escort back. But I must say, my dear, it is excessive- ly foolish to make yourself so un- necessarily uneasy about your fa- ther. You know as well as I, that he troubles the doctors as little as yourself ; though, to tell the truth," she added, incautiously, " I think Mr Moray has been somewhat ne- glectful."
For her father's most unusual silence was the grief from which Grace was suffering. As a rule, and under all circumstances, he had invariably written once a- week, al- though sometimes his letters might bo delayed, and two or three of them delivered together. But since the latest arrival, full five weeks had elapsed ; and so Miss Moray was uneasy, irritable, and indignant. She had blamed his neglect, that she might calm her anxiety ; but she never endured the slightest imputation 011 him from another, as Madame might well have known had she reflected.
" You maybe quite sure, Madame 3lobineau, that Mr Moray has good reasons for what he does ; and for nil we know to the contrary, he may be any distance away in the jungles. You speak as if he were living in Pau or Paris, where there
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are always letter-boxes round the corner, and telegraph stations over the way."
Madame was quick to read the unwonted storm-signals. It was rarely Grace spoke of her father as " Mr Moray "; and, moreover, they had been perpetually discussing during the last fortnight all con- ceivable contingencies that might have caused the delay. So she wisely waived the question and changed the subject, and the ex- pedition to the Eaux-Chaudes was duly carried out. It did not prove much of a specific. Grace con- tinued to be restless and preoccu- pied. It was the more disquieting in one whose natural temperament was placid ; and Madame Robineau, becoming seriously uneasy, watched for letters almost as eagerly as her charge.
The reverend pastor had given himself leave from his flock on the Monday morning, arriving at the Eaux-Chaudes in time to accom- pany the ladies on a drive to Gabas. They had come back to a substan- tial tea; and it was one of the consequences of Grace's feminine upbringing that she had rather a liking for that most objectionable meal, and usually did it ample jus- tice. But on this particular even- ing the mountain air had affected her as little as the mountain scen- ery. She showed herself as indif- ferent to the cutlets and the trout as to the snow-covered summits, and the black pine-woods, and to the green waters rushing under the rocks and through the thickets of natural box-shrubberies. And yet, as if she had not had enough of communing with nature, when she rose from the table she left her friends to a conjugal tete-d-tete, and went off for a solitary ramble down the valley. Though she tripped lightly away, she did not walk very far. At the first sharp turn, she
