she cried, "and it's that that's just the worst of it! They'll take
you, they'll take you, and what in the world will then become of me?"
She threw herself afresh upon her pupil and wept over her with the
inevitable effect of causing the child's own tears to flow. But Maisie
couldn't have told you if she had been crying at the image of their
separation or at that of Sir Claude's untruth. As regards this deviation
it was agreed between them that they were not in a position to bring it
home to him. Mrs. Wix was in dread of doing anything to make him, as
she said, "worse"; and Maisie was sufficiently initiated to be able to
reflect that in speaking to her as he had done he had only wished to be
tender of Mrs. Beale. It fell in with all her inclinations to think of
him as tender, and she forbore to let him know that the two ladies had,
as SHE would never do, betrayed him.

She had not long to keep her secret, for the next day, when she went
out with him, he suddenly said in reference to some errand he had first
proposed: "No, we won't do that--we'll do something else." On this, a
few steps from the door, he stopped a hansom and helped her in; then
following her he gave the driver over the top an address that she lost.
When he was seated beside her she asked him where they were going; to
which he replied "My dear child, you'll see." She saw while she watched
and wondered that they took the direction of the Regent's Park; but
she didn't know why he should make a mystery of that, and it was not
till they passed under a pretty arch and drew up at a white house
in a terrace from which the view, she thought, must be lovely that,
mystified, she clutched him and broke out: "I shall see papa?"

He looked down at her with a kind smile. "No, probably not. I haven't
brought you for that."