look as if you had lost much of your natural rest: but I know how the mind keeps the body up. Yours is an earnest mind, Margaret, that will always keep you up: but, my dear, I do hope it has been an easy mind too. You will excuse my saying so."
Margaret more than excused it, but she could not immediately answer.
The tears trembled in her eyes, and her lip quivered when she would have spoken. Morris stroked her hair, and kissed her forehead, as if she had been still a child, and whispered that all things ended well in God's own time.
"Oh, yes! I know," said Margaret. "Has Hester told you how prosperous we are growing? I do not mean only about money. We are likely to have enough of that too, for my brother's old patients have almost all sent for him again: but we care the less about that from having discovered that we were as happy with little money as with much. But it is a satisfaction and pleasure to find my brother regarded more and more as he ought to be: and yet greater to see how nobly he deserves the best that can be thought of him."
"He forgives his enemies, no doubt, heaping coals of fire on their heads."
"You will witness it Morris. You will see him among them, and it will make your heart glow. Poor creatures! I have heard some of them own to him, from their sick beds, with dread and tears, that they broke his windows, and slandered his name. Then you should see him smile when he tells them that is all over now, and that they will not mistake him so much again."
"No, never. He has shown himself now what he is."
"He sat up two nights with one poor boy who is now likely to get through; and in the middle of the second night, the boy's father got up from his sick bed in the next room, and came to my brother, to say that he felt that ill luck would be upon them all, if he did not confess that he put that very boy behind the hedge, with stones in his hand, to throw at Edward, the day he was mobbed at the almshouses. He was deluded by the neighbours, he said, into thinking that my brother meant ill by the poor."
"They have learned to the contrary now, my dear. And what does Sir William Hunter say of my master, now-a-days? Do you know?"
"There is very little heard of Sir William and Lady Hunter at present-- shut up at home as they are. But Dr Levitt, who loves to make peace, you know, and tell what is pleasant, declares that Sir William Hunter has certainly said that, after all, it does not so much signify which way a man votes at an election, if he shows a kind heart to his neighbours in troublesome times."
"Sir William Hunter has learned his lesson then, it seems, from this affliction. I suppose he sees that one who does his duty as my master does at a season like this, is just the one to vote according to his conscience at an election. But, my dear, what sort of a heart have these Hunters got, that they shut themselves up as you say?"
"They give their money freely: and that is all that we can expect from them. If they have always been brought up and accustomed to fear sickness, and danger, and death, we cannot expect that they should lose their fear at a time like this. We must be thankful for what they give; and their money has been of great service, though there is no doubt that their example would have been of more."
"One would like to look into their minds, and see how they regard my master there."
"They regard him, no doubt, so far rightly as to consider him quite a different sort of person from themselves, and no rule for them. So far they are right. They do not comprehend his satisfactions and ease of mind; and it is very likely that they have pleasures of their own which we do not understand."
"And they are quite welcome, I am sure, my dear, as long as they do not meddle with my master's name. That is, as he says, all over now. After this, however, the people in Deerbrook will be more ready to trust in my master's skill and kindness than in Sir William Hunter's grandeur and money, which can do little to save them in time of need."
Margaret explained how ignorantly the poor in the neighbourhood had relied on the fortune-tellers, who had only duped them; how that which would have been religion in them if they had been early taught, and which would have enabled them to rely on the only power which really can save, had been degraded by ignorance into a foolish and pernicious superstition. Morris hoped that this also was over now. She had met some of these conjurors on the Blickley road; and seen others breaking up their establishment in the lanes, and turning their backs upon Deerbrook. Whether they were scared away by the mortality of the place, or had found the tide of fortune-telling beginning to turn, mattered nothing as long as they were gone.
The tea-table was cleared, and Morris and Margaret were admiring the baby as he slept, when Hester and her husband returned. Mrs Howell was very unwell, and likely to be worse. All attempts to bring Miss Miskin to reason, and induce her to enter her friend's room, were in vain. She bestowed abundance of tears, tremors, and foreboding on Mrs Howell's state and prospects, but shut herself up in a fumigated apartment, where she promised to pray for a good result, and to await it. The maid was a hearty lass, who would sit up willingly, under Hester's promise that she should be relieved in the morning. The girl's fear was of not being able to satisfy her mistress, whom it was not so easy to nurse as it might have been, from her insisting on having everything arranged precisely as it was in her poor dear Howell's last illness. As Miss Miskin had refused to enter the chamber, Hester had been obliged to search a chest of drawers for Mr Howell's last dressing-gown, which Miss Miskin had promised should be mended and aired, and ready for wear by the morning.
"Margaret!" cried Hester, as her sister was lighting her candle. The exclamation made Edward turn round, and brought back Morris into the parlour after saying `Good-night.' "Margaret! your ring?"
There was as much joy as shame in Margaret's crimson blush. She let her sister examine the turquoise, and said: "Yes, this is the boon of to-day."
"Edward's hundred pounds has come," said Hester: "but that is nothing to this."
Margaret's eyes thanked her. She just explained that poor Platt had been the thief, and had restored it to her before he died, and that she could get no explanation, no tidings of Hester's watch; and she was gone.
"Dr Levitt's early stir about this ring prevented its being disposed of, I have no doubt," said Edward. "If so, it is yet possible that we may recover your watch. I will speak to Dr Levitt in the morning."
"Dear Margaret!" said Hester. "She is now drinking in the hue of that turquoise, and blessing it for being unchanged. She regards this recovery of it as a good omen, I see; and far be it from us to mock at such a superstition!"
As usual, when she was upon this subject, Hester looked up into her husband's face: and as usual, when she spoke on this subject, he made no reply.
CHAPTER FORTY FOUR.
LATE RELIGION.
A few days after Morris's return, she told Margaret that the tidings in the village of Miss Rowland's illness were not good. Mrs Rowland was quite as sure as ever that, if anybody could cure Matilda, it was Mr Walcot; but Mr Walcot himself looked anxious; and a bed had been put up for him in the room next to the sick child. Margaret wondered why Mr Rowland did not send to Blickley for further advice: but Morris thought that Mrs Rowland would not give up her perfect faith in Mr Walcot, if all her children should die before her face.
When Morris had left the room, Margaret was absorbed in speculations, as she played with her sister's infant--speculations on the little life of children, and on their death. Her memory followed Matilda through every circumstance in which she had seen her. The poor little girl's very attitude, voice, and words--words full, alas! of folly and vanity--rose again upon her eye and ear, in immediate contrast with the image of death, and the solemnity of the life to come. In the midst of these thoughts came tears of shame and self-reproach; for another thought (how low! how selfish!) thrust itself in among them--that she was secure for the present from Philip's departure--that he would not leave Deerbrook while Matilda was in a critical state. As these tears rolled down her cheeks, the baby looked full in her face, and caught the infection of grief.
He hung his little lip, and looked so woe-begone, that Margaret dashed away the signs of her sorrow, and spoke gaily to him; and, as the sun shone in at the moment upon the lustres on the mantelpiece, she set the glass-drops in motion, and let the baby try to catch the bright colours that danced upon the walls and ceiling. At this moment, Hester burst in with a countenance of dismay.
"Margaret, my husband has a headache!"
A headache was no trifle in these days.
"Anything more than a headache?" asked Margaret. "No other feeling of illness? There is nothing to wonder at in a mere headache. It is very surprising that he has not had it before, with all his toil and want of sleep."
"He declares it is a trifle," said Hester: "but I see he can hardly hold up. What shall I do?"
"Make him lie down and rest, and let me go to Mrs Howell instead of you. She will be a little disappointed; but that cannot be helped. She must put up with my services to-day. Now, do not frighten yourself, as if no one ever had a headache without having a fever."
"I shall desire Morris to let no one in; and to bring no messages to her master while his headache lasts."
"Very right. I will tell her as I go for my bonnet. One more kiss before I go, baby. Do not wait tea for me, Hester. I cannot say when I shall be back."
Margaret had been gone to Mrs Howell's about an hour and a half, when there was a loud and hasty knock at the door of the corner-house. It roused Hope from a doze into which he had just fallen, and provoked Hester accordingly. There was a parley between Morris and somebody in the hall; and presently a voice was heard calling loudly upon Mr Hope.
Hester could not prevent her husband from springing from the bed, and going out upon the stairs. Mr Rowland was already half-way up, looking almost beside himself with grief.
"You must excuse me, Mr Hope--you must not judge me hardly;--if you are ill, I am sorry...sir; but sir, my child is dying. We fear she is dying, sir; and you must come, and see if anything can save her. I shall never forgive myself for going on as we have been doing. She has been sacrificed--fairly sacrificed, I fear."
"Nay, Mr Rowland, I must comfort you there," said Hope, as they walked rapidly along the street. "I have had occasion to see a great deal of Mr Walcot and his professional conduct, in the course of the last few weeks; and I am certain that he has a very competent knowledge of his business. I assure you he shows more talent, more power altogether, in his professional than his unprofessional conduct; and in this particular disease he has now had much experience."
"God bless you for saying so, my dear sir! It is like you--always generous, always just and kind! You must forgive us, Mr Hope. At a time like this, you must overlook all causes of offence. They are very great, I know; but you will not visit them upon us now."
"We have only to do with the present now," said Hope. "Not a word about the past, I entreat you."
Mrs Rowland, to-day reckless of everything but her child, was standing out on the steps, watching, as for the last hope for her Matilda.
"She is much worse, Mr Hope; suddenly and alarmingly worse. This way: follow me."
Hope would speak with Mr Walcot first. As he entered the study, to await Mr Walcot, Philip passed out. They did not speak.
"Oh, Philip! speak to Mr Hope!" cried Mrs Rowland. "For God's sake do not do anything to offend him now!"
"I will do everything in my power, madam, to save your child," said Hope. "Do not fear that the conduct of her relations will be allowed to injure her."
"My love," said Mr Rowland, "Mr Hope came from a sick bed to help us.
Do not distrust him. Indeed he deserves better from us."
"Pray forgive me," said the miserable mother. "I do not well know what I am saying. But I will atone for all if you save my child."
"Priscilla!" cried her brother, from the doorway, against which he was leaning. His tone of wonder was lost as Walcot entered, and the study was left for the conference of the medical men.
As the gentlemen went upstairs to Matilda's room, they saw one child here, and another there, peeping about, in silence and dismay. As Hope put his hand on the head of one in passing, Mr Rowland said: "There is a carriage coming for them presently, to take them away. Anna and George are now with Miss Young, and she will take them all away.
She is very good: but I knew we might depend upon her--upon her heart, and her forgiveness. Ah! you hear the poor child's voice. That shows you the way."
Matilda was wandering, and, for the moment, talking very loud.
Something about grandmamma seeing her dance, and "When I am married," struck the ear as Hope entered her chamber, and entirely overset the mother. Matilda was soon in a stupor again.
It was impossible to hold out much prospect of her recovery. It was painful to every one to hear how Mrs Rowland attempted to bribe Mr Hope, by promises of doing him justice, to exert himself to the utmost in Matilda's behalf. He turned away from her, again and again, with a disgust which his compassion could scarcely restrain. Philip was so far roused by the few words which had been let drop below-stairs, as to choose to hear what passed now, in the antechamber to the patient's room. It was he who decidedly interposed at last. He sent his brother-in-law to Matilda's bedside, dismissed Mr Walcot from the room, and then said-- "A very few minutes will suffice, I believe, sister, to relieve your mind: and they will be well spent. Tell us what you mean by what you have been saying so often within this quarter of an hour. As you hope in Heaven--as you dare to ask God to spare your child, tell us the extent to which you feel that you have injured Mr Hope."
Hope sank down into the window-seat by which he had been standing. He thought the whole story of his love was now coming out. He waited for the first words as for a thunderclap. The first words were-- "Oh, Philip! I am the most wretched woman living! I never saw it so strongly before; I believe I did it with an idea of good to you; but I burned a letter of Margaret's to you."
"What letter? When?"
"The day you left us last--the day you were in the shrubbery all the morning--the day the children found the shavings burnt."
"What was in the letter? Did you read it?"
"No; I dared not."
"What made you burn it?"
"I was afraid you would go to her, and that your engagement would come on again."
"Then what you told me--what made me break it off--could not have been true."
"No, it was not--not all true."
"What was true, and what was not?"
Mrs Rowland did not answer, but looked timidly at Mr Hope. Now was the moment for him to speak.
"It was true," said he, "that, at the very beginning of my acquaintance with Hester and Margaret, I preferred Margaret--and that my family discerned that I did--as true as that Hester has long been the beloved of my heart--beloved as--but I cannot speak of my wife, of my home, in the hearing of one who has endeavoured to profane both. All I need say is that neither Hester nor Margaret ever knew where my first transient fancy lighted, while they both know--know as they know their own hearts--where it has fixed. It is not true that Margaret ever loved any one but you, Enderby; and Mrs Rowland cannot truly say that she ever did."
"What was it then that Margaret confided to my mother?" asked Enderby, turning to his sister.
"I cannot tell what possessed me at the time to say so, but that I thought I was doing the best for your happiness--but--but, Philip, I really believe now, that Margaret never did love any one but you. I know nothing to the contrary."
"But my mother?"
"She knew very little of any troubles in Mr Hope's family; and--and what she did hear was all from me."
"Do you mean that all you told me of Margaret's confidences to my mother was false?"
There was no answer; but Mrs Rowland's pale cheeks grew paler.
"Oh God! what can Margaret have thought of me all this time?" cried Philip.
"I can tell you what she has thought, I believe," said Hope. "Her brother and sister have read her innocent mind, as you yourself might have done, if your faith in her had been what she deserved. She has believed that you loved her, and that you love her still. She has believed that some one--that Mrs Rowland traduced her to you: and in her generosity, she blames you for nothing but that you would not see and hear her--that you went away on the receipt of her letter--of that letter which it now appears you never saw."
"Where is she?" cried Enderby, striding to the door.
"She is not at home. You cannot find her at this moment: and if you could, you must hear me first. You remember the caution I gave you when we last conversed--in the abbey, and again in the meadows."
"I do; and I will observe it now."
"You remember that she is unaware--" "That you ever--that that interview with Mrs Grey ever took place? She shall never learn it from me. It is one of those facts which have ceased to exist--which is absolutely dead, and should be buried in oblivion. You hear, Priscilla?"
She bowed her head.
"You believe that--."
"Say no more, brother. Do not humble me further. I will make what reparation I can--indeed I will--and then perhaps God will spare my child."
Hope's passing reflection was, "How alike is the superstition of the ignorant and of the wicked! My poor neighbours stealing to the conjuror's tent in the lane, and this wretched lady, hope alike to bribe Heaven in their extremity--they by gifts and rites, she by remorse and reparation.--How different from the faith which say; `Not as I will, but as thou wilt!'"
"Where _is_ Margaret? Will you tell me?" asked Enderby, impatiently.
"But before I see her, I ought to ask forgiveness from you, Hope. You find how cruelly I have been deceived--by what incredible falsehood--.
But," glancing at his pale sister, "we will speak no more of that. If, in the midst of all this error and wretchedness, I have hurt your feelings more than my false persuasions rendered necessary...I hope you will forgive me."
"And me! Will you forgive me?" asked Mrs Rowland, faintly.
"There is nothing to pardon in you," said Hope to Philip. "Your belief in what your own sister told you in so much detail can scarcely be called a weakness; and you did and said nothing to me that was not warranted by what you believed.--And I forgive you, madam. I will do what I can to relieve your present affliction; and, as long as you attempt no further injustice towards my family, no words shall be spoken by any of us, to remind you of what is past."
"You are very good, Mr Hope."
"I tell you plainly," he resumed, "that you cannot injure us beyond a certain point. You cannot make it goodness in us to forget what is past. It is of far less consequence to us what you and others think of us than what we think of our neighbours. Our chief sorrow has been the spectacle of yourself in your dealings with us. We shall be thankful to be reminded of it no more. And now enough of this."
"Where _is_ Margaret?" again asked Enderby, as if in despair of an answer.
"She is nursing Mrs Howell. As soon as I have seen this poor child again, I will go home, and take care that Margaret is prepared to see you. Remember how great the surprise, the mystery, must be to her."
"If the surprise were all--" said Philip.--"But will she hear me? Will she forgive me? Will she trust me?"
"Was there ever a woman who really loved who would not hear, would not forgive, would not trust?" said Hope, smiling. "I must not answer for Margaret; but I think I may answer for woman in the abstract."
"I will follow you in an hour, Hope."
"Do so. Now, madam."
And Hope followed Mrs Rowland again to the bedside of her dying child.
CHAPTER FORTY FIVE.
REST OF THE PLACABLE.
Margaret was not at Mrs Howell's at the moment that her brother believed and said she was. She had been there just in time to witness the poor woman's departure; and she was soon home again and relating the circumstances to Hester, by the fireside. Even the news that Edward was now in the same house with Philip, could not efface from her mind what she had seen; nor could Hester help listening, though full of anxiety about her husband.
"Miss Miskin was prevailed upon to leave her room at the last, I suppose?"
"Scarcely. Poor Nanny was supporting her mistress's head when I went in; and she said, with tears, that there was no depending on any one but us. They both looked glad enough to see me: but then, nothing would satisfy Mrs Howell but that I should warm myself, and be seated."
"To the last! and she offered you some cherry-bounce, I suppose."
"Yes; just as usual. Then she told me that it would be as well to mention now, in case she should grow worse, and be in any danger, that she should be gratified if you and I would select each a rug or screen pattern from her stock, and worsteds to work it with: and she gave a broad hint that there was one with a mausoleum and two weeping willows, which she hoped one of us would choose; and that perhaps her name might fill up the space on the tomb. Poor Nanny began to cry; and this affected Mrs Howell; and she begged earnestly to see Miss Miskin."
"And then she came, I suppose."
"Not she! She would not come till her friend sent a message threatening to haunt her if she did not."
"Did you carry the message?"
"No; but Nanny did; and, I thought, with hearty good will; Miss Miskin came trembling, but too much frightened to cry. She would not approach nearer than the doorway, and there fell down on her knees, and so remained the whole time she was receiving directions about the shop and the stock,--`in case,' as the poor soul again said, `of my getting worse, so as to be in any danger.' And yet Dr Levitt thought he had told her, plainly enough, what he thought of her state this morning."
"And was she aware at last? or did she go off unconsciously?"
"I think she was aware; I think so from her last words--`Oh, my poor dear Howell!' I sat behind the curtain while she was speaking to Miss Miskin--sometimes so faintly that Nanny had to repeat her words, to make them heard as far as the door."
"That selfish wretch--Miss Miskin!"
"It was very moving, I assure you, to hear not one word of reproach,--or even notice of Miss Miskin's desertion in this illness. What was said was common-place enough; but every word was kind. I have it all. I took it down with my pencil, behind the curtain; for I was sure Miss Miskin would never remember it. Mrs Howell went on till she came to directions about the bullfinch that her poor dear Howell used to laugh to see perched upon her nightcap of a morning; and then she grew unintelligible. I thought she was only fainting; but while we were trying to revive her, Nanny said she was going. Miss Miskin drew back into the passage, shut the door, and made her escape. Her friend looked that way once more, and said that we had all been very good to her. She mentioned her husband, as I told you, and then died very quietly."
"Miss Miskin knows, of course?"
"I told her, and did not pretend to feel much sympathy in her lamentations. I told her she had lost a friend who would have watched over her, I believed, till her last breath, if she had been the one attacked by the fever."
"What did she say?"
"She exclaimed a great deal about how good we all were, and wondered what Deerbrook would have done without us; and said she was sure I was too kind to think of leaving her in the house with the corpse, with only Nanny. When I declined passing the night there, she comforted herself with thinking aloud that her friend would not haunt her--certainly would not haunt her--as she _had_ gone to her room at last. Her final question was, how soon I thought it likely that she should feel the fever coming on, in case of her having caught it, after all, by going into the room."
"What an end to a sentimental friendship of so many years!"
"I rather expect to hear in the morning that she has taken refuge in some neighbour's house, and left Nanny alone with the corpse to-night."
"My husband's knock!" cried Hester, starting up. "How is your headache, love?" asked she anxiously, as she met him at the room door.
"Gone, quite gone," he replied. "I must step down into the surgery for a minute, about this poor little girl's medicine; and then I have a great deal to tell you."
The sisters sat in perfect silence till his return.
"Matilda?" said Margaret, looking up at her brother.
"She is very ill;--not likely to be better."
"And poor Mrs Howell is gone," said Hester. "What a sweep it is! Did you hear, love? Mrs Howell is dead."
"I hear. It is a terrible destruction that we have witnessed. But I trust it is nearly over. I know of only one or two cases of danger now, besides this little girl's. Poor Matilda! But we have little thought to spare, even for her, to-night. If I did not know that Margaret is ready for whatever may betide," he continued, fixing his benevolent gaze upon her, "and if, moreover, I were not afraid that some one would be coming to tell my news if I do not get it out at once, I should hesitate about saying what I have to say."
"Philip has been explaining--He is coming," said Margaret, with such calmness as she could command.
"Enderby is coming; and some one else, whose explanations are more to the purpose, has been explaining. Mrs Rowland, alarmed and shaken by her misery, has been acknowledging the whole series of falsehoods by which she persuaded, convinced her brother that you did not love him-- that you were, in fact, attached elsewhere. I see how angry you are, Hester. I see you asking in your own mind how Enderby could be thus deluded--how he could trust his sister rather than Margaret--how I can speak of him as deserving to have her after all this. Your questions are reasonable enough, love, and yet they cannot be answered. Your doubts of Enderby are reasonable enough; and yet I declare to you that he is in my eyes almost, if not quite, blameless."
"Thank you, brother!" said Margaret, looking up with swimming eyes.
"There is one great point to be settled," resumed Hope: "and that is, whether you will both be content to bury in silence the subject of this quarrel, from this hour, relying upon my testimony and Mrs Rowland's."
"Oh, Edward, do not put your name and hers together!"
"For Enderby's justification, and for Margaret's sake, my name shall be joined with the arch-fiend's, if necessary, my love. You must, as I was saying, rely upon the testimony of those who know the whole, that Enderby's conduct throughout has been, if not the very wisest and best, perfectly natural, and consistent with the love for Margaret which he has cherished to this hour."
"I knew it," murmured Margaret.
"He will himself disclose as much as he thinks proper, when he comes: but he comes full of fear and doubt about his reception."
Margaret hung her head, feeling that it was well she was reminded what reason there was for his coming with doubt and trembling in his heart.
"As he comes full of fear and doubt," resumed Hope, "I must tell you first that he never received your last letter, Margaret. He thought you would not answer his. He thought you took him at his word about not attempting explanation."
"What an unhappy accident!" cried Hester. "Who carried that letter?
How did it happen?"
"It was no accident, my dear. Mrs Rowland burned that letter."
Margaret covered her face with her hands; then, suddenly looking up, she cried: "Did she read it?"
"No. She says she dared not. Why, Margaret, you seem sorry that she did not! You think it would have cleared you. I have no doubt she thought so too; and that that was the reason why she averted her eyes from it. Yes, it was a cruel injury, Margaret. Can you forgive it, do you think?"
"Not to-night," said Hester. "Do not ask it of her to-night."
"I believe I may ask it at this very moment. The happy can forgive. Is it not so, Margaret?"
"For myself I could and I do, brother. I would go now and nurse her child, and comfort her. But--" "But you cannot forgive the wretchedness she has caused to Philip.
Well, if you each forgive her for your own part, there is a chance that she may yet lift up her humbled head."
"What possessed her to hate us so?" said Hester.
"Her hatred to us is the result of long habits of ill-will, of selfish pride, and of low pertinacity about small objects. That is the way in which I account for it all. She disliked you first for your connection with the Greys; and then she disliked me for my connection with you.
She nourished up all her personal feelings into an opposition to us and our doings; and when she had done this, and found her own only brother going over to the enemy, as she regarded it, her dislike grew into a passion of hatred. Under the influence of this passion, she has been led on to say and to do more and more that would suit her purposes, till she has found herself sunk in an abyss of guilt. I really believe she was not fully aware of her situation, till her misery of to-day revealed it to her."
"Poor thing!" said Margaret. "Is there nothing we can do to help her?"
"We will ask Enderby. I take hers to be no uncommon case. The dislikes of low and selfish minds generally bear very much the character of hers, though they may not be pampered by circumstances into such a luxuriance as in this case. In a city, Mrs Rowland might have been an ordinary spiteful fine lady. In such a place as Deerbrook, and with a family of rivals' cousins incessantly before her eyes, to exercise her passions upon, she has ended in being--" "What she is," said Margaret, as Hope stopped for a word.
"Margaret is less surprised than you expected, is she not?" said Hester.
"You did not suppose that she would sit and listen as she does to your analysis of Mrs Rowland. But if the truth were known, she carries a prophecy about her on her finger. I have no doubt she has been expecting this very news ever since she recovered her ring. Yes or no, Margaret?"
"I should rather say she has carried a prophecy in her heart all these long months," said Hope, "of which that on her finger is only the symbol."
"However it may be," said Hester, "it has prepared a reception for Mr Enderby. There is no resisting a prophecy. What is written is written."
"I must hear him, you know," said Margaret, gently.
"You must; and you must hear him favourably," said her brother.
"I had forgotten," said Hester, ringing the bell. "Morris, a good fire in the breakfast-room, immediately."
Within the hour, Philip and Margaret were by that fireside, finally wedded in heart and soul. It was astonishing how little explanation was needed when Margaret had once been told, in addition to the fact of her letter having been destroyed, that she was declared to have made Mrs Enderby the depository of her confidence about a prior attachment.
There was, however, as much to relate as there was little to explain.
How Enderby's heart burned within him, when, in sporting with the idea of a prior attachment, it came out what Margaret had felt at the moment of his intrusion upon the conference with Hope, of which he had since, as at the time, been so jealous! the amusement on her own part, and the joy on Hester's, which she was trying to conceal by her downcast looks!
How his soul melted within him when she owned her momentary regret at being saved from under the ice, and the consolation and stimulus she had derived from her brother's expression of affection for her on the spot!
How clear, how true a refutation were these revealings of the imputations that had been cast upon her! and how strangely had the facts been distorted by a prejudiced imagination! How sweet in the telling was the story of the ring, so sad in the experience! and the recountings of the times that they had seen each other of late. Philip had caught more glimpses than she. He came down--he dared not say to watch over her in this time of sickness--but because he could not stay away when he heard of the condition of Deerbrook. But for this sickness would they have met--should they ever have understood each other again? This was a speculation on which they could not dwell--it led them too near the verge of the grave which was yawning for Matilda. Mrs Rowland would have been relieved, but the relief would have been not unmixed with humiliation, if she could have known how easily she was let off in this long conference. Not only can the happy easily forgive, but they are exceedingly apt to forget the causes and the history of their woes; and the wretched lady who, in the midst of her grief and terror for her child, trembled at home at the image of the lovers she had injured, was, to those lovers in their happiness, much as if she had never existed.
"Mrs Howell!" said Margaret, hearing her sister mention their departed neighbour, after Philip was gone. "Is it possible that it was this very afternoon that I saw that poor woman die?"
"Even so, dear. How many days, or months, or years, have you lived since? A whole age of bliss, Margaret!"
Margaret's blush said "Yes."
CHAPTER FORTY SIX.
DEERBROOK IN SUNSHINE.
On the first news of the fever being gone, the Greys returned to Deerbrook, and Dr Levitt's family soon followed. The place wore a strange appearance to those who had been absent for some time. Large patches of grass overspread the main street, and cows might have pastured on the thatch of some of the cottages, while the once green churchyard looked brown and bare from the number of new graves crowded in among the old ones. In many a court were the spring-flowers running wild over the weedy borders, for want of hands to tend them; and the birds built in many a chimney from which the blue smoke had been wont to rise in the morning air. Sophia and her sisters noted these things as they walked through the place on the morning after their arrival, while their father was engaged in inspecting the parish register, to learn how many of his neighbours were gone, and their mother was paying her visit of condolence to Mrs Rowland.
Fanny and Mary were much impressed this day with Matilda's death. They had first wondered, and then wept, when they heard of it at a distance: and now, when once more on the spot where they had seen her daily, and had hourly criticised her looks, her sayings, and doings, they were under a strong sense of the meanness and frivolity of their talk, and the unkindness of their feelings about one whose faults could hardly be