"Oh, about his marrying:--that he is the darling of his family,--that large family interests hang upon his marrying,--that all his relations think it is time he was settling, and that he told her last week that he was of that opinion himself:--and then she went on to say that there was the most delightful accordance in their views for him;--that they did not much value beauty,--that they should require for him something of a far higher order than beauty, and which indeed was seldom found with it--"

"Insolent creature! Did she say that to you?"

"Indeed she did: and that her brother's wife must be of a good family, with a fortune worthy of his own; and, naturally, of a county family."

"A county family!" said Margaret, half laughing. "What matters county or city, when two people are watching over one another for life and death, and for hereafter?"

"With such people as Mrs Rowland," said Hester, "marriage is a very superficial affair. If family, fortune, and equipage are but right, the rest may be left to Providence. Temper, mind, heart--. The worst of all, however, was her ending--or what was made her ending by our being interrupted."

"Well! what was her finish?"

"She put her face almost under my bonnet, as she looked smiling at me, and said there was a young lady--she wished she could tell me all about it--the time would come when she might--there was a sweet girl, beloved by them all for many years, from her very childhood, whom they had hopes of receiving, at no very distant time, as Philip's wife."

"I do not believe it," cried Margaret. After a pause, she added, "Do you believe it, Hester?"

"I am sure I do not know. I should not rate Mrs Rowland's word very highly: but this would be such a prodigious falsehood! It is possible, however, that she may believe it without its being true. Or, such a woman might make the most, for the occasion, of a mere suspicion of her own."

"I do not believe it is true," repeated Margaret.

"At all events," concluded Hester, "nothing that Mrs Rowland says is worth regarding. I was foolish to let myself be ruffled by her."

Margaret tried to take the lesson home, but it was in vain. She was ruffled; and, in spite of every effort, she did believe in the existence of the nameless young lady. It had been a day of trouble; and thus was it ending in fresh sorrow and fear.

Morris came in, hesitated at the door, was told she might stay, and immediately busied herself in the brushing of hair and the folding of clothes. Many tears trickled down, and not a word was spoken, till all the offices of the toilet were finished. Morris then asked, with a glance at the book-shelf, whether she should go or stay.

"Stay, Morris," said Hester, gently. "You shall not suffer for our being unhappy to-night. Margaret, will you, can you read?"

Margaret took the volume in which it was the sisters' common practice to read together, and with Morris at night. While Morris took her seat, and reverently composed herself to hear, Margaret turned to the words which have stilled many a tempest of grief, from the moment when they were first uttered to mourners, through a long course of centuries, "Let not your heart be troubled." "Believe in G.o.d; believe in me." Morris sometimes spoke on these occasions. She loved to hear of the many mansions in the House of the Father of all; and she said that though it might seem to her young ladies that their parents had gone there full soon, leaving them to undergo trouble by themselves, yet she had no doubt they should all be at peace together, sooner or later, and their pa.s.sing troubles seem as nothing. Even this simple and obvious remark roused courage in the sisters. They remembered what their father had said to them about his leaving them to encounter the serious business and trials of life, and how they had promised to strive to be wise and trustful, and to help each other. This day the serious business and trials of life had manifestly begun: they must strengthen themselves and each other to meet them. They agreed upon this, and in a mood of faith and resolution fell asleep.

CHAPTER ELEVEN.

MEDIATION.

Mr Hope's case turned out more favourably than any of his attendants and friends had ventured to antic.i.p.ate. For some days the symptoms continued as alarming as at first; but from the hour that he began to amend, his progress towards recovery was without drawback, and unusually rapid. Within a month, the news circulated through the village, that he had been safely brought home to his own lodgings; and the day after, the ladies at Mr Grey's were startled by seeing him alight from a gig at the door, and walk up the steps feebly, but without a.s.sistance. He could not stay away any longer, he declared. He had been above a month shut up in a dim room, without seeing any faces but of doctor, nurse, and Mrs Grey, and debarred from books; now he was well enough to prescribe for himself; and he was sure that a little society, and a gradual return to his usual habits of life, would do him more good than anything.

Mrs Grey kept all her own children out of sight during this first visit, that Mr Hope might not see too many faces at once. She admitted only Hester and Margaret, and Alice, who brought him some refreshment.

The girl made him a low curtsey, and looked at him with an expression of awe and pleasure, which brought tears into the eyes of even her mistress. Mr Hope had been a benefactor to this girl. He had brought her through a fever. She had of late little expected ever to see him again. Mr Hope replied to her mute looks:

"Thank you, Alice, I am much better. I hope to be quite well soon. Did not you make some of the good things Mrs Grey has been kind enough to bring me?--I thought so. Well, I'm much obliged to you; and to everybody who has been taking pains to make me well. I do not know how it is," he continued, when Alice had left the room, "but things do not appear as they used to do. Perhaps my eyes are dim still; but the room does not seem bright, and none of you look well and merry."

Mrs Grey observed that she had drawn the blinds down, thinking he would find it a relief after the sunshine. Margaret said ingenuously--

"We are all well, I a.s.sure you; but you should not wonder if you find us rather grave. Much has happened since we met. We have been thinking of you with great anxiety for so long, that we cannot on a sudden talk as lightly as when you used to come in every day."

"Ah!" said he, "I little thought, at one time, that I should ever see any of you again in this world."

"We have thought of you as near death," said Margaret; "and since that, as having a sick-room experience, which we respect and stand in awe of; and that is reason enough for our looking grave."

"You feel as if you had to become acquainted with me over again. Well, we must lose no time; here is a month gone that I can give no account of."

Hester felt how differently the case stood with her. The last month had been the longest she had ever known,--tedious as to the state captive, serving his noviciate to prison life. She would have been thankful to say that she could give no account of the past month. She inquired how the accident happened; for this was still a mystery to everybody. Mr Hope could not clear up the matter: he remembered parting with Sydney, and trotting, with the bridle of the pony in his hand, to the top of the ascent,--the point where Sydney lost sight of him: he had no distinct remembrance of anything more,--only a sort of impression of his horse rearing bolt upright. He had never been thrown before; and his supposition was, that a stone cast from behind the hedge might have struck his horse: but he really knew no more of the affair than any one else. The ladies all trusted he would not ride the same horse again; but this he would not promise: his horse was an old friend; and he was not in a hurry to part with old friends. He was glad to find that Miss Young had not laid the blame on the pony, but had ridden it through the woods as if nothing had happened.

"Not exactly so," said Margaret, smiling.

"The young folks did not enjoy their excursion very much, I fancy," said Mrs Grey, smiling also. "Mrs Rowland was quite put out, poor soul!

You know she thinks everything goes wrong, on purpose to plague her."

"I think she had some higher feelings on that occasion," said Mr Hope, gently, but gravely. "I am indebted to her for a very anxious concern on my account, and for kind offices in which perhaps none of my many generous friends have surpa.s.sed her."

Mrs Grey, somewhat abashed, said that Mrs Rowland had some good qualities: it was only a pity that her unhappy temper did not allow them fair play.

"It is a pity," observed Mr Hope; "and it is at the same time, an appeal to us to allow her the fair play she does not afford herself.

That sofa looks delightfully comfortable, Mrs Grey."

"Oh, you are tired; you are faint, perhaps?"

"Shall I ring?" said Hester, moving to the bell.

"No, no," said he, laughing; "I am very well at present. I only mean that I should like to stay all day, if you will let me. I am sure that sofa is full as comfortable as my own. I may stay, may I not?"

"No, indeed you shall not, this first day. If you will go away now before you are tired, and if I find when I look in upon you this evening, that you are not the worse for this feat, you shall stay longer to-morrow. But I a.s.sure you it is time you were at home now. My dears, just see whether the gig is at the door."

"So I only get sent away by begging to stay," said Mr Hope. "Well, I have been giving orders to sick people for so many years, that I suppose it is fairly my turn to obey now. May I ask you to send to Widow Rye's to-day? I looked in as I came; and her child is in want of better food, better cooked, than she is able to give him."

"I will send him a dinner from our table. You are not going to see any more patients to-day, I hope?"

"Only two that lie quite in my road. If you send me away, you must take the consequences. Farewell, till tomorrow."

"Mr Grey and I shall look in upon you this evening. Now do not look about you out of doors, to catch anybody's eye, or you will be visiting a dozen patients between this house and your own."

There were, indeed, many people standing about, within sight of Mr Grey's door, to see Mr Hope come out. All Mr Grey's children and servants were peeping through the shrubbery. Mrs Enderby waved her hand from a lower, and her two maids looked out from an upper window.

The old man of a hundred years, who was sunning himself on the bank, as usual, rose and took off his hat: and the little Reeves and their schoolfellows stood whispering to one another that Mr Hope looked rarely bad still. Mrs Plumstead dropped a low curtsey, as she stood taking in the letter-bag, at her distant door. Mrs Grey observed to Hester on the respect which was paid to Mr Hope all through the place, as if Hester was not feeling it in her heart of hearts at the moment.

Mrs Grey flattered herself that Mr Hope was thinking of Hester when he said his friends did not look well. She had been growing thinner and paler for the last month, and no doubt remained in Mrs Grey's mind about the cause. Hester had commanded herself, to her sister's admiration; but she could not command her health, and that was giving way under perpetual feelings of anxiety and humiliation. Mrs Grey thought all this had gone quite far enough. She was more fond and proud of Hester every day, and more impatient that she should be happy, the more she watched her. She spoke to Margaret about her. Margaret was prepared for this, having foreseen its probability; and her answers, while perfectly true and sincere, were so guarded, that Mrs Grey drew from them the comfortable inference that she alone penetrated the matter, and understood Hester's state of mind. She came to the resolution at last of making the young people happy a little sooner than they could have managed the affair for themselves. She would help them to an understanding, but it should be with all possible delicacy and regard to their feelings. Not even Mr Grey should know what she was about.

Opportunities were not wanting. When are opportunities wanting to match-makers? If such do not find means of carrying their points, they can construct them. Few match-makers go to work so innocently and securely as Mrs Grey; for few can be so certain of the inclinations of the parties as she believed herself. Her own admiration of Hester was so exclusive, and the superiority of Hester's beauty so unquestionable, that it never occurred to her that the attraction which drew Mr Hope to the house could be any other than this. About the state of Hester's affections she felt justly confident; and so, in her view, nothing remained to be done but to save her from further pining by bringing about an explanation. She was frequently with Mr Hope at his lodgings, during his recovery, seeing that he took his afternoon rest, and beguiling a part of his evenings; in short, watching over him as over a son, and declaring to Hester that he was no less dear to her.

One evening, when she was spending an hour in Mr Hope's parlour, where Mr Grey had deposited her till nine o'clock, when he was to call for her, she made the same affectionate declaration to Mr Hope himself,-- that he was as dear to her as if he had been her own son; "and," she continued, "I shall speak to you with the same freedom as I should use with Sydney, and may, perhaps, ten years hence."

"Pray do," said Mr Hope. "I shall be glad to hear anything you have to say. Are you going to find fault with me?"

"Oh dear, no! What fault should I have to find with you? unless, indeed, it be a fault or a folly to leave your own happiness and that of another person in needless uncertainty."

Mr Hope changed colour, quite to the extent of her wishes.

"I know," continued she, "that your illness has put a stop to everything; and that it has left you little nerve for any explanation of the kind: but you are growing stronger every day now, and the case is becoming so serious on the other side that I own I dread the consequences of much further delay. You see I speak openly."