For the next few days she tried to learn from Joad and her guardian what all these doings meant. Both of them refused to speak, and the tension of Dora's nerves was only relaxed by a letter from Allen, in which he stated that he would return on the second of August, and would see her the next day.
"He means to explain," thought the girl, putting the welcome letter away in her desk. "In two or three days I shall know why he quarrelled with my guardian, and why Mr. Pallant warned me against him. But I must scold Allen for his neglect."
The communication relieved her greatly. Of late she had been so bewildered and harassed that she had almost doubted whether Allen loved her truly. Yet he had told her so a hundred times, and she was satisfied that he spoke truly, from that subtle instinct which never deceives a woman. He loved her, he adored her, and none other than she would ever be his wife. Before that belief the dismal prophecies of Mrs. Tice and Edermont, the strange warning of Pallant, counted as nothing. Dora believed that Allen loved her, and could explain away all the mysteries of the past weeks. In that belief she was content to wait.
And all this time Mr. Edermont was surprisingly bright. A weight appeared to have been lifted off his shoulders, and he looked ten years younger. He was scarcely past fifty, notwithstanding his white locks and hoary beard; and he began to talk of leaving his retirement and going out to mix with the world once more. Dora knew that he had a large income, and could afford to live in the most luxurious manner. It had often been a surprise to her that he had lived so long in seclusion and almost penury. From sundry circumstances she gathered that he had for years been labouring under a dread of death by violence, hence his anxiety that the house should be carefully locked up. Now that dread had been removed--as he more than hinted--by a communication from Pallant, and he could take life easily. Looking back on the fears which had haunted him these twenty years, Dora no longer wondered at the cowardice and terror of the puny creature. Rather was she astonished that with so terrific a shadow to fight he had kept himself out of a lunatic asylum. Stronger men than he succumbed to such influences.