"Why don't you bring up
that chair and sit down? You look tired."
He laughed--a little hardly.
"I have been tired so long," he said, "that it has become a habit.
Brooks, will you think me guilty of an impertinence, I wonder? I have
intruded upon your concerns."
Brooks looked up with his eyes full of questioning. "That fellow
Lavilette," Arranmore continued, seemed worried about your anonymous
subscription. I was in an evil temper yesterday afternoon, and Verity
amused me. So I wrote and confounded the fellow by explaining that it
was I who sent the money--the thousand pounds you had."
"You?" Lady Caroom exclaimed, breathlessly.
"You sent me that thousand pounds?" Brooks cried.
They exchanged rapid glances: A spot of colour burned in Lady Caroom's
cheeks. She felt her heart quicken, an unspoken prayer upon her lips.
Brooks, too, was agitated.
"Upon my word," Lord Arranmore remarked, coldly, "I really don't know
why my whim should so much astound you. I took care to explain that I
sent it without the slightest sympathy in the cause--merely out of
compliment to an acquaintance.
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