THE PRINCESS
by this dumb demonstration have been naming to Maggie the price, naming it as a question for Maggie herself, a sum of money that she properly was to find. She must remain safe and Maggie must pay—what she was to pay with being her own affair.
Straighter than ever thus the Princess again felt it all put upon her, and there was a minute, just a supreme instant, during which there burned in her a wild wish that her father would only look up. It throbbed for these seconds as a yearning appeal to him—she would chance it, that is, if he would but just raise his eyes and catch them, across the larger space, standing in the outer dark together. Then he might be affected by the sight, taking them as they were; he might make some sign—she scarce knew what—that would save her; save her from being the one this way to pay all. He might somehow show a preference—distinguishing between them; might out of pity for her signal to her that this extremity of her effort for him was more than he asked. That represented Maggie's one little lapse from consistency—the sole small deflexion in the whole course of her scheme. It had come to nothing the next minute, for the dear man's eyes had never moved, and Charlotte's hand, promptly passed into her arm, had already, had very firmly drawn her on—quite for that matter as from some sudden, some equal perception on her part too of the more ways than one in which their impression could appeal. They retraced their steps along the rest of the terrace, turning the corner of the house, and presently came abreast of the other windows, those of the pompous drawing-room still lighted and
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