De Montville's face was hidden in his shaking hands. "If I could thank you--if I could make you comprehend--" he murmured brokenly.
"I do comprehend. I comprehend perfectly." Mordaunt's voice was soothing now, almost motherly. He stroked the bent shoulders with a consoling touch. "Come, man! You are used up; you are ill. Lie down and rest."
He coaxed his forlorn guest down upon the pillows again and drew the bedclothes over him. Then for a space he sat beside him, divining that he would recover his self-command more quickly with him there than left to his own devices.
A nervous hand, bony as a skeleton's, came hesitatingly forth to him at length, and he gripped and held it for several quiet seconds more.
Finally he rose. "I'll leave you now. If you are wanting anything, you have only to ask for it. I shall be in the next room. Quite comfortable?"
Yes, he was quite comfortable. He assured him of this in unsteady tones, and begged that Mr. Mordaunt would give himself no further trouble on his account. He would sleep--he would sleep.
As the assurance was uttered somewhat incoherently, through lips half closed, Mordaunt judged that he could be trusted to carry out this intention, and so left him, to return to his writing-table in the adjoining room.
Ten minutes later he crept back noiselessly and found him in a deep sleep. He stood a moment to watch him, and noted with compassion a faint, pathetic smile that rested on the worn features.
But he did not guess that Bertrand de Montville had returned in his dreams to a land of enchantment, where the sun was always shining, and the sea was at peace, even that land where first he had forgotten the great goal of his ambition and had halted by the way to listen to a girl's light laughter while he drew for her his pictures in the sand.
"My dear Trevor, do let me warn you against making yourself in any way responsible for Chris's brothers."
Mrs. Forest spoke impressively. She was rather fond of warning people. It was in a fashion her attitude towards life.
"You will find," she continued, "that Chris herself will need a firm hand--a very firm hand. Though so young, she is not, I fear, very pliable. I have known her do the most unheard-of things, chiefly, I must admit, from excess of spirits. They all suffer from that upon occasion. It is a most difficult thing to cope with."