ot well you ought to see a
doctor, my dear child."
Helen burst into bitter sobs. "I thought I saw Milly, Mr. Varick--poor,
poor Milly! She looked exactly as she looked when I last saw her, in her
coffin, excepting that her eyes were open. She was standing just behind
you--and oh, I shall never, never forget her look! It was a terrible,
terrible look--a look of hatred. Yet I cared for her so much! You know I
did all that was possible for one woman to do for another during those
few weeks that I knew her?"
Lionel Varick's face turned a curious, greyly pallid tint. It was as if
all the natural colour was drained out of it.
"Where's Bubbles?" he asked, in a scarcely audible voice.
For a moment no one answered him, and then Blanche said quietly:
"Bubbles is over there, in the confessional, asleep."
He turned and walked quickly over to the carved, box-like confessional,
and drew aside the green-embroidered curtain.
Yes, the girl lay there asleep--or was she only pretending? Her breast
rose and fell, her eyes were closed.
Varick took hold of her arm with no gentle gesture, and she awoke with a
cry of surprise and pain. "What is it? Don't do that!" she said in a
hoarse and sleepy tone.
And then, on seeing who it was, she smiled wryly. "Is it forbidden to
get in here?" she asked, still speaking in a heavy, dull way. "I didn't
know it was,"--and stumblingly she stepped down out of the confessional.
Varick scowled at her, and made no answer to her question. Together they
walked over to where the other three were standing--Miss Burnaby still
gazing at her niece, with an annoyed, frightened expression on her face.
As Bubbles and Varick came up to her, Helen got up from the chair in
which she had sunk back. She held a handkerchief to her face, and was
making a great effort to regain her self-control and composure.
"Please forgive me, Mr. Varick. I oughtn't to have told you what I
thought I saw--for I'm sure it was only a dream, a horrible, startling
dream. But--but you made me tell you, didn't you?"
She looked up into his pale, convulsed face with an anguished
expression. "I think I'll go upstairs now, and rest a little before I
dress for dinner," and then she walked across the room, and out of the
door, with a steady step.
Bubbles stretched out her arms with a weary gesture. "What's all this
fuss about?" she asked. "I feel absolutely done--done--done! Not at all
as if I'd had a good long sleep. I wonder h
|