Chapter 16 - Page 2

came in, walking round the table to Fan's side, and
bidding her parents "Good morning," but omitting the usual custom of
kissing father and mother. Stopping at the girl's side she stooped and
touched her forehead with her lips, then placed the branch of May by the
side of her plate.

"This is for you," she said. "I know what a flower-worshipper you are."

"Constance, you ought not to say that!" said her mother, reprovingly.

"Why not?" said the other, going to her place and sitting down, a red
flush on her face. "It is a common and very innocent expression, I
fancy."

"That may be your opinion. The expression you use so lightly has only one
and a very solemn meaning for me."

Fan glanced wonderingly from one to the other, then dropped her eyes on
her flowers. In a vague way she began to see that her new friends did not
exist in happy harmony together, and it surprised and troubled her. The
bright sunny look had gone from Miss Churton's face, and the meal
proceeded almost in silence to the end.

And yet father, mother, and daughter all felt that there was an
improvement in their relations, that the restraint caused by the presence
of this shy, silent girl would make their morning and midday meetings at
meal-time less a burden than they had hitherto been. To Miss Churton
especially that triangle of three persons, each repelling and repelled by
the two others, had often seemed almost intolerable. Husband and wife had
long ceased to have one interest, one thought, one feeling in common;
while the old affection between mother and daughter had now so large an
element of bitterness mingled with it that all its original sweetness
seemed lost. As for her degenerate, weak-minded, tippling father, Miss
Churton regarded him with studied indifference. She never spoke of him,
and tried never to think of him when he was out of the way; when she saw
him, she looked through him at something beyond, as if he had no more
substance than one of Ossian's ghosts, through whose form one might see
the twinkling of the stars. It was better, she wisely thought, to ignore
him, to forget his existence, than to be vexed with feelings of contempt
and hostility.

Mr. Churton, after finishing his breakfast, retired to his "study," with
the air of a person who has letters to write. His study was really only a
garret which his wife had fitted up as a comfortable smoking den, where
he was privileged to blow the abhorrent tobacco-cloud with impunity,
since the pestilent vapour flew away heavenwards from the open window;
moreover, while smoking at home he was safe, and not fuddling his weak
brains and running up a long bill at the "King