"You shall come back to-morrow, or the next day," her father had said. "But mamma seems to think people will put a bad construction on your being so much away from home so soon after our marriage."

"Oh, papa, I'm afraid Mrs. Hamley will miss me! I do so like being with her."

"I don't think it is likely she will miss you as much as she would have done a month or two ago. She sleeps so much now, that she is scarcely conscious of the lapse of time. I'll see that you come back here again in a day or two."

So out of the silence and the soft melancholy of the Hall Molly returned into the all-pervading element of chatter and gossip at Hollingford. Mrs. Gibson received her kindly enough. Once she had a smart new winter bonnet ready to give her as a present; but she did not care to hear any particulars about the friends whom Molly had just left; and her few remarks on the state of affairs at the Hall jarred terribly on the sensitive Molly.

"What a time she lingers! Your papa never expected she would last half so long after that attack. It must be very wearing work to them all; I declare you look quite another creature since you were there.

One can only wish it mayn't last, for their sakes."

"You don't know how the Squire values every minute," said Molly.

"Why, you say she sleeps a great deal, and doesn't talk much when she's awake, and there's not the slightest hope for her. And yet, at such times, people are kept on the tenter-hooks with watching and waiting. I know it by my dear Kirkpatrick. There really were days when I thought it never would end. But we won't talk any more of such dismal things; you've had quite enough of them, I'm sure, and it always makes me melancholy to hear of illness and death; and yet your papa seems sometimes as if he could talk of nothing else. I'm going to take you out to-night, though, and that will give you something of a change; and I've been getting Miss Rose to trim up one of my old gowns for you; it's too tight for me. There's some talk of dancing,--it's at Mrs. Edwards'."

"Oh, mamma, I cannot go!" cried Molly. "I've been so much with her; and she may be suffering so, or even dying--and I to be dancing!"

"Nonsense! You're no relation, so you need not feel it so much. I wouldn't urge you, if she was likely to know about it and be hurt; but as it is, it's all fixed that you are to go; and don't let us have any nonsense about it. We might sit twirling our thumbs, and repeating hymns all our lives long, if we were to do nothing else when people were dying."

"I cannot go," repeated Molly. And, acting upon impulse, and almost to her own surprise, she appealed to her father, who came into the room at this very time. He contracted his dark eyebrows, and looked annoyed as both wife and daughter poured their different sides of the argument into his ears. He sat down in desperation of patience. When his turn came to p.r.o.nounce a decision, he said,--

"I suppose I can have some lunch? I went away at six this morning, and there's nothing in the dining-room. I have to go off again directly."

Molly started to the door; Mrs. Gibson made haste to ring the bell.

"Where are you going, Molly?" said she, sharply.

"Only to see about papa's lunch."

"There are servants to do it; and I don't like your going into the kitchen."

"Come, Molly! sit down and be quiet," said her father. "One comes home wanting peace and quietness--and food too. If I am to be appealed to, which I beg I may not be another time, I settle that Molly stops at home this evening. I shall come back late and tired.

See that I have something ready to eat, goosey, and then I'll dress myself up in my best, and go and fetch you home, my dear. I wish all these wedding festivities were well over. Ready, is it? Then I'll go into the dining-room and gorge myself. A doctor ought to be able to eat like a camel, or like Major Dugald Dalgetty."

It was well for Molly that callers came in just at this time, for Mrs. Gibson was extremely annoyed. They told her some little local piece of news, however, which filled up her mind; and Molly found that, if she only expressed wonder enough at the engagement they had both heard of from the departed callers, the previous discussion as to her accompanying her stepmother or not might be entirely pa.s.sed over. Not entirely though; for the next morning she had to listen to a very brilliantly touched-up account of the dance and the gaiety which she had missed; and also to be told that Mrs. Gibson had changed her mind about giving her the gown, and thought now that she should reserve it for Cynthia, if only it was long enough; but Cynthia was so tall--quite overgrown, in fact. The chances seemed equally balanced as to whether Molly might not have the gown after all.

CHAPTER XVIII.

MR. OSBORNE'S SECRET.

[Ill.u.s.tration (unt.i.tled)]

Osborne and Roger came to the Hall; Molly found Roger established there when she returned after this absence at home. She gathered that Osborne was coming; but very little was said about him in any way. The Squire scarcely ever left his wife's room; he sat by her, watching her, and now and then moaning to himself. She was so much under the influence of opiates that she did not often rouse up; but when she did, she almost invariably asked for Molly. On these rare occasions, she would ask after Osborne--where he was, if he had been told, and if he was coming? In her weakened and confused state of intellect she seemed to have retained two strong impressions--one, of the sympathy with which Molly had received her confidence about Osborne; the other, of the anger which her husband entertained against him. Before the squire she never mentioned Osborne's name; nor did she seem at her ease in speaking about him to Roger; while, when she was alone with Molly, she hardly spoke of any one else.

She must have had some sort of wandering idea that Roger blamed his brother, while she remembered Molly's eager defence, which she had thought hopelessly improbable at the time. At any rate, she made Molly her confidante about her first-born. She sent her to ask Roger how soon he would come, for she seemed to know perfectly well that he was coming.

"Tell me all Roger says. He will tell you."

But it was several days before Molly could ask Roger any questions; and meanwhile Mrs. Hamley's state had materially altered. At length Molly came upon Roger sitting in the library, his head buried in his hands. He did not hear her footstep till she was close beside him.

Then he lifted up his face, red, and stained with tears, his hair all ruffled up and in disorder.

"I've been wanting to see you alone," she began. "Your mother does so want some news of your brother Osborne. She told me last week to ask you about him, but I did not like to speak of him before your father."

"She has hardly ever named him to me."

"I don't know why; for to me she used to talk of him perpetually. I have seen so little of her this week, and I think she forgets a great deal now. Still, if you don't mind, I should like to be able to tell her something if she asks me again."

He put his head again between his hands, and did not answer her for some time.

"What does she want to know?" said he, at last. "Does she know that Osborne is coming soon--any day?"

"Yes. But she wants to know where he is."

"I can't tell you. I don't exactly know. I believe he's abroad, but I'm not sure."

"But you've sent papa's letter to him?"

"I've sent it to a friend of his who will know better than I do where he's to be found. You must know that he isn't free from creditors, Molly. You can't have been one of the family, like a child of the house almost, without knowing that much. For that and for other reasons I don't exactly know where he is."

"I will tell her so. You are sure he will come?"

"Quite sure. But, Molly, I think my mother may live some time yet; don't you? Dr. Nicholls said so yesterday when he was here with your father. He said she had rallied more than he had ever expected.

You're not afraid of any change that makes you so anxious for Osborne's coming?"

"No. It's only for her that I asked. She did seem so to crave for news of him. I think she dreamed of him; and then when she wakened it was a relief to her to talk about him to me. She always seemed to a.s.sociate me with him. We used to speak so much of him when we were together."

"I don't know what we should any of us have done without you. You've been like a daughter to my mother."

"I do so love her," said Molly, softly.

"Yes; I see. Have you ever noticed that she sometimes calls you 'f.a.n.n.y?' It was the name of a little sister of ours who died. I think she often takes you for her. It was partly that, and partly that at such a time as this one can't stand on formalities, that made me call you Molly. I hope you don't mind it?"

"No; I like it. But will you tell me something more about your brother? She really hungers for news of him."

"She'd better ask me herself. Yet, no! I am so involved by promises of secrecy, Molly, that I couldn't satisfy her if she once began to question me. I believe he's in Belgium, and that he went there about a fortnight ago, partly to avoid his creditors. You know my father has refused to pay his debts?"

"Yes: at least, I knew something like it."

"I don't believe my father could raise the money all at once without having recourse to steps which he would exceedingly recoil from. Yet for the time it places...o...b..rne in a very awkward position."

"I think what vexes your father a good deal is some mystery as to how the money was spent."

"If my mother ever says anything about that part of the affair," said Roger, hastily, "a.s.sure her from me that there's nothing of vice or wrong-doing about it. I can't say more: I'm tied. But set her mind at ease on that point."

"I'm not sure if she remembers all her painful anxiety about this,"

said Molly. "She used to speak a great deal to me about him before you came, when your father seemed so angry. And now, whenever she sees me she wants to talk on the old subject; but she doesn't remember so clearly. If she were to see him, I don't believe she would recollect why she was uneasy about him while he was absent."