"Gordon does n't think so," Bernard said.
Angela looked at him a moment.
"I am very glad to hear it," she rejoined, gently.
"Yes, it is very fortunate."
"Is he well?" the girl asked. "Is he happy?"
"He has all the air of it."
"I am very glad to hear it," she repeated. And then she moved the latch
of the gate and passed in. At the same moment her mother appeared in the
open door-way. Mrs. Vivian had apparently been summoned by the sound
of her daughter's colloquy with an unrecognized voice, and when she saw
Bernard she gave a sharp little cry of surprise. Then she stood gazing
at him.
Since the dispersion of the little party at Baden-Baden he had not
devoted much meditation to this conscientious gentlewoman who had been
so tenderly anxious to establish her daughter properly in life; but
there had been in his mind a tacit assumption that if Angela deemed that
he had played her a trick Mrs. Vivian's view of his conduct was not more
charitable. He felt that he must have seemed to her very unkind, and
that in so far as a well-regulated conscience permitted the exercise of
unpractical passions, she honored him with a superior detestation.
The instant he beheld her on her threshold this conviction rose to the
surface of his consciousness and made him feel that now, at least, his
hour had come.
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