No ordinary measure of time could be sufficient to calculate what this was; it was hours; it was weeks; it was minutes. Lydia had time to go over everything in her thoughts; to glance at the aspect of affairs at home; the consternation of Will and Tom; the happiness of her mother; the mingled wonder and delight of Joan. She had time to go through half-a-dozen scenes with Lionel; to speculate how her father would take it: to realise even old Isaac Oliver’s gape of astonishment when he heard that Harry had taken his name of all names in the world--before at last there came a sound, unfamiliar to her, but which Mr. Bonamy knew, the little click of the swing door at the end of the passage which communicated with the office. Then came the sound of steps. Lydia rose up to her feet to meet the decision whatever it was. She trembled so that she could scarcely stand, and seeing this the Vice-Consul, though not yet in charity with her, went to her side in his kindness, and drew her arm within his. “Lean upon me, my poor child,” he said. They stood on one side of the broad band of light which divided the room, and which, though it showed to them the other two who came in, also arm-in-arm, concealed them from the new-comers. Rita, tearful and excited but not melancholy, was clinging to her husband’s arm. He with an eager, pre-occupied face pressed forward across the light. “Confound that sunshine! who opened the window?” were the first words he said, then strode along across it, paying but little regard to Rita, whom he dragged after him. When he got face to face with Lydia he paused.
“Was it you that sent me that message?” he said. “Is it true?”
Lydia’s emotion fled in a moment at this matter-of-fact address. She drew her arm out of Mr. Bonamy’s, trembling no longer.
“It is true,” she said; “they have advertised and done everything to find you.”
“I know--I know. I saw that; but they never said why. And they would like to take it from me! Will and Tom--and their father.”
“For shame!” she said; “not father. He is the one that stands out--with mother, and Joan, and me.”
He had been quite steady and business-like, almost stern, up to this moment; now he suddenly fell a-laughing in the strangest way.