“Do you suppose that is any satisfaction to
me?” He walked decidedly away, and entered
by the library window, and she stood grieved and wondering
whether she had been wrong in pitying, or whether he
were too harsh in his indignation. It was a
sign that her tone and spirit had recovered, that
she did not succumb in judgment, though she felt utterly
puzzled and miserable till she recollected how unwell,
weary, and unhappy he was, and that every fresh perception
of his sister’s errors was like a poisoned arrow
to him; and then she felt shocked at having obtruded
the subject on him at all, and when she found him
leaning back in his chair, spent and worn out, she
waited on him in the quietest, gentlest way she could
accomplish, and tried to show that she had put the
subject entirely aside. However, when they were
next alone together, he turned his face away and muttered,
“What did that woman say to you?”
“Oh, Alick, I am sorry I began! It only
gives you pain.”
“Go on—”
She did go on till she had told all, and he uttered
no word of comment. She longed to ask whether
he disapproved of her having permitted the interview;
but as he did not again recur to the topic, it was
making a real and legitimate use of strength of mind
to abstain from tearing him on the matter. Yet
when she recollected what worldly honour would once
have exacted of a military man, and the conflicts
between religion and public opinion, she felt thankful
indeed that half a century lay between her and that
terrible code, and even as it was, perceiving the
strong hold that just resentment had taken on her
husband’s silently determined nature, she could
not think of the neighbourhood of the Carleton family
without dread.
THE POST BAG.
“Thefts, like ivy on a ruin, make the rifts
they seem to shade.”—
C.
G. Duffy.
“August
3d, 7 A. M.
“My Dear Colonel Keith,—Papa is come,
and I have got up so early in the morning that I have
nothing to do but to write to you before we go in
to Avoncester. Papa and Mr. Beechum came by the
six o’clock train, and Lady Temple sent me in
the waggonette to meet them. Aunt Ailie would
not go, because she was afraid Aunt Ermine would get
anxious whilst she was waiting. I saw papa directly,
and yet I did not think it could be papa, because
you were not there, and he looked quite past me, and
I do not think he would have found me or the carriage
at all if Mr. Beechum had not known me. And then,
I am afraid I was very naughty, but I could not help
crying just a little when I found you had not come;
but perhaps Lady Keith may be better, and you may
come before I go into court to-day, and then I shall
tear up this letter. I am afraid papa thought
I was unkind to cry when he was just come home, for
he did not talk to me near so much as Mr. Beechum
did, and his eyes kept looking out as if he did not
see anything near, only quite far away. And
I suppose Russian coats must be made of some sort
of sheep that eats tobacco.”
