Lucia listened, and tried to be interested, and to lose the sense of shame and mortification mixed with real compunction, which was making her wretched.

But her heart ached, and besides, she had cried, sitting all alone on her bedroom floor, till she was exhausted and half blind.

All the while her mother talked, she kept thinking of Maurice--she neither called him "Poor Maurice," in her thoughts, nor "Dear Maurice"-- but only "Maurice, Maurice," over and over again--her friend who was gone from her, whom she had justly lost.
But when she was growing more and more absorbed in her own regrets, and her mother's voice was beginning to sound to her like one in a dream, there came a sudden sharp ring at the door-bell.

Could it be Maurice?
She grew red as fire while she listened--but the door opened and shut, and there were no steps but Claudine's in the hall.
The maid came in.

"A letter for madame, and a packet for mademoiselle,"-- both directed by Maurice.
Lucia took hers to the window.