Chapter xxxvi. Love and Pride.
A Cry of terror from the room told me that I had been heard. For a moment more nothing happened. Then the child’s voice reached me, wild and shrill: “Open the shutters, mamma! I said he was coming — I want to see him!”
There was still an interval of hesitation before the mother opened the shutters. She did it at last. I saw her darkly at the window, with the light behind her, and the child’s head just visible above the lower part of the window-frame. The quaint little face moved rapidly up and down, as if my self-appointed daughter were dancing for joy!
“Can I trust my own senses?” said Mrs. Van Brandt. “Is it really Mr. Germaine?”
“How do you do, new papa?” cried the child. “Push open the big door and come in. I want to kiss you.”
There was a world of d
