His chestnut hair had been dressed with as great care as though he were attending a levee, and Leduc had insisted upon placing a small round patch under his left eye, that it might--said Leduc--impart vivacity to a countenance that looked over-wan from his long confinement.
He reclined there, and, as I have said, was almost happy.
The creature of sunshine that was himself at heart, had broken through the heavy clouds that had been obscuring him.

An oppressive burden was lifted from his mind and conscience.

That sword-thrust through the back a month ago had been guided, he opined, by the hand of a befriending Providence; for although he had, as you see, survived it, it had none the less solved for him that hateful problem he could never have solved for himself, that problem whose solution,--no matter which alternative he had adopted--must have brought him untold misery afterwards.
As it was, during the weeks that he had lain helpless, his life attached to him by but the merest thread, the chance of betraying Lord Ostermore was gone, nor--the circumstances being such as they were--could Sir Richard Everard blame him that he had let it pass.
Thus he knew peace; knew it as only those know it who have sustained unrest and can appreciate relief from it.
Nature had made him a voluptuary, and reclining there in an ease which the languor born of his long illness rendered the more delicious, inhaling the tepid summer air that came to him laden with a most sweet attar from the flowering rose-garden, he realized that with all its cares life may be sweet to live in youth and in the month of June.
He sighed, and smiled pensively at the water-lilies; nor was his happiness entirely and solely the essence of his material ease.

This was his third morning out of doors, and on each of the two mornings that were gone Hortensia had borne him company, coming with the charitable intent of lightening his tedium by reading to him, but remaining to talk instead.
The most perfect friendliness had prevailed between them; a camaraderie which Mr.Caryll had been careful not to dispel by any return to such speeches as those which had originally offended but which seemed now mercifully forgotten.
He was awaiting her, and his expectancy heightened for him the glory of the morning, increased the meed of happiness that was his.

But there was more besides.