He revolved the situation over and over. Halcyone must be made aware of
the accident, if she had not already read of it in the morning papers;
but she must not be allowed to do anything rash--and as he got thus far
in his meditations, a waiter knocked at the old-fashioned sitting-room
door, and Halcyone herself brushed past him into the room.
She was deadly pale, and for a moment did not speak.
Mrs. Anderton, it appeared, thinking she would be tired from her
unaccustomed journey, had suggested she should breakfast in bed, which
Halcyone, thankful to be alone, had gratefully agreed to; and when on
her breakfast tray which came up at eight o'clock she saw a daily paper,
she had eagerly opened it, and after searching the unfamiliar sheets for
the political news, her eye had caught the paragraph about John
Derringham's accident. In this particular journal the notice was merely
the brief one of the evening before, but it was enough to wring
Halcyone's heart.
She bounded from bed and got Priscilla to dress her in the shortest
possible time, and the faithful nurse, seeing that her beloved lamb was
in some deep distress, forbore to question her.
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