Lucia turned her head to where Flossie was sitting by a table, sitting very upright, with her little air of strained propriety.

“Is it—­is it that pretty lady?  Do you think I might go up and speak to her?  I would so like to know her.”

“I’ll bring her to you.  There’s rather a crowd just now in the other room.”

He went to her, hardly knowing how he went.

“Flossie,” he said, “I want to introduce you to Miss Harden.”

Flossie’s eyes brightened with surprise and pleasure; for she had learnt from Mrs. Downey that the visitor was the daughter of Sir Frederick Harden; and Lucia’s distinction subdued her from afar.  Keith, being aware of nothing but Lucia, failed to perceive, as he otherwise might have done, that he had risen in Flossie’s opinion by his evident intimacy with Miss Harden.  She came blushing and smiling and a little awkward, steered by Keith.  But for all her awkwardness she had never looked prettier than at that moment of her approach.

If Keith had wanted to know precisely where he stood in the order of Lucia’s intimacies, he might have learnt it from her reception of Miss Walker.  By it he might have measured, too, the height of her belief in him, the depth of her ignorance.  She who had divined him was ready to take his unknown betrothed on trust; to credit her, not with vast intellect, perhaps (what did that matter?), but certainly with some rare and lovely quality of soul.  He loved her; that was enough.  Lucia deduced the quality from the love, not the love from the quality.  His pretty lady must be lovable since he loved her.  He had noticed long ago that Lucia’s face had a way of growing more beautiful in the act of admiration; as if it actually absorbed the loveliness it loved to look upon.  And now, as she made a place for Flossie at her side, it wore that look of wonder, ardent yet restrained, that look of shy and tentative delight with which five years ago she had approached his Helen.  It was as if she had said to herself, “He always brought his best to show me.  Five years ago he brought me his dream, to read and care for.  Now he brings me the real thing, to read and care for too.”  She was evidently preparing to read Flossie as if she had been a new and beautiful poem.

He was unaware of all this; unaware of everything except the mingled beatitude and torture of the moment.  He sat leaning forward, staring over his clasped hands at Lucia’s feet, where he longed to fall down and worship.  He heard her telling Flossie how glad she was to meet her; how unexpected was her finding of him here, after fire years; how five years ago she had known him in Devonshire; and so on.  But in his ears the music of her voice detached itself wholly from the meaning of her words.  Thus he missed the assurance which, if he had only listened intelligently, they might have had for him; the assurance of an indestructible friendship that welcomed and enfolded his pretty lady for his sake.