the hands that held the book were within the
brightness of the light, which on the other side streamed down upon
Lucy's fair shoulders and soft young face, and upon the work in her
hands. In the corner was the light continuous murmur of talk; the
half-seen figure of the Contessa, generally leaning back, looking up to
Sir Tom, who stood with his arm on the mantelpiece with much animation,
gesticulation of her hands and subdued laughter, the most lively
current of sound, soft, intensified by little eloquent breaks, by
emphatic gestures, by sentences left incomplete, but understood all the
better for being half said. There were many evenings in which Lucy sat
there with a little wonder, but no other active feeling in her mind. It
is needless to say that it was not pleasant to her. She would sit and
wonder wistfully whether her husband had forgotten she was there, but
then reminded herself that of course it was his duty to think of the
Contessa first, and consoled herself that by and by the stranger would
go away, and all would be as it had been. As time went on, the desire
that this should happen, and longing to have possession of her home
again, grew so strong that she could scarcely subdue it, and it was with
the greatest difficulty that she kept all expression of it from her
lips. And by and by, the warmth of this restrained desire so absorbed
Lucy that she scarcely dared allow herself to speak lest it should burst
forth, and there seemed to herself to be continually going on in her
mind a calculation of the chances, a scrutiny of everything the Contessa
said which seemed to point at such a movement. But, indeed, the Contessa
said very little upon which the most sanguine could build. She said
nothing of her arrangements at all, nor spoke of what she was going to
do, and answered none of Lucy's ardent and innocent fishings after
information. The evenings became more and more intolerable to Lady
Randolph as they went on. She was glad that anybody should come, however
little she might care for their society, to break these private
conferences up.

And this was not all, nor even perhaps the worst, of the vague evils not
yet defined in her mind, and which she was so very reluctant to define,
which Lucy had to go through. At breakfast, when she was alone with her
husband, matters were almost worse. Sir Tom, it was evident, began to
feel the _tete-a-tete_ embarrassing. He did not know what to say to his
little wife when they