She did not know what was
to become of her. She had not slept for many nights. She had made up her
mind to die as her father had died, because it seemed the only thing to
do, when suddenly the thought of Stephen had flashed into her mind, as
if sent there by her guardian angel. She had heard that he was good and
charitable to everybody, and once she had seen him looking at her
kindly, in court, as if he were sorry for her, and could read something
of what was in her heart. She had imagined it perhaps. But would he
forgive her for writing to him? Would he help her, and save her life?
Any one who knew Stephen could have prophesied what his answer would be.
He had hated it when she snatched his hand to kiss at the end of their
interview; but he would scarcely have been a human young man if he had
not felt a sudden tingle of the blood at the touch of such lips as
Margot Lorenzi's. Never had she seemed so beautiful to him since that
first day; but he had called again and again, against his brother's
urgent advice (when he had confessed the first visit); and the story
that the Duchess of Amidon was telling her friends, though founded
entirely on her own imagination of the scene which had brought about
Stephen's undoing, was not very far from the truth.
Now, he saw a picture of Margot as he had seen her in the lodgings she
hated; and he wished to heaven that he might think of her as he had
thought of her then.
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