Part 65 (1/2)

'Oh! but Charlie is much better, and that is a great comfort. I am glad you are come home, Mary.'

'We are going to have some magic music,' was said at the other end of the room. 'Who will play?'

'Little Amy!' said Mr. Edmonstone. 'Where is she? She always does it to admiration. Amy, come and be a performer.'

Amy rose, and came forward, but the colour had flushed into her cheeks again, and the recollection occurred to Mary, that her fame as a performer, in that way, arose from the very amusing manner in which she and Sir Guy had conducted the game last year. At the same moment her mother met her, and whispered,--

'Had you rather not, my dear?'

'I can do it, mamma, thank you--never mind.'

'I should like to send you up to Charlie--he has been so long alone.'

'Oh! thank you, dear mamma,' with a look of relief.

'Here is Charlotte wild to be a musician,' said Mrs. Edmonstone.

'Perhaps you will see how she can manage; for I think Charles must want a visit from his little nurse.'

Amy moved quietly away, and entered Charles's room, full of warm grat.i.tude for the kindness which was always seeking how to spare her.

Charles was asleep, and throwing a shawl round her, she sat down in the dim light of the lamp, relieved by the stillness, only broken by now and then a louder note of the music down-stairs. It was very comfortable, after all that buzz of talk, and the jokes that seemed so nonsensical and tiresome. There were but two people who could manage to make a party entertaining, and that was the reason it was so different last year.

Then Amy wondered if she was the only person who felt sick at heart and dreary; but she only wondered for a moment--she murmured half aloud to herself, 'I said I never would think of him except at my prayers! Here I am doing it again, and on Christmas night. I won't hide my eyes and moan over my broken reed; for Christmas is come, and the circles of song are widening round! Glory! good will, peace on earth! How he sang it last year, the last thing, when the people were gone, before we went up to bed. But I am breaking my resolution again. I must do something.'

She took up a book of sacred poetry, and began to learn a piece which she already nearly knew; but the light was bad, and it was dreamy work; and probably she was half asleep, for her thoughts wandered off to Sintram and the castle on the Mondenfelsen, which seemed to her like what she had pictured the Redclyffe crags, and the castle itself was connected in her imagination with the deep, echoing porch, while Guy's own voice seemed to be chanting--

Who lives forlorn, On G.o.d's own word doth rest; His path is bright With heavenly light, His lot among the blest.

'Are you there, Amy?' said Charles, waking. 'What are you staying here for? Don't they want you?'

'Mamma was so kind as to send me up.'

'I am glad you are come, for I have something to tell you. Mr. Ross has been up to see me, you know, and he has a letter from Guy.'

Amy's heart beat fast, and, with eyes fixed on the ground, she listened as Charles continued to give an account of Guy's letter about Coombe Prior. 'Mr. Ross is quite satisfied about him, Amy,' he concluded. 'I wish you could have heard the decided way in which he said, ”He will _live_ it down.”'

Amy's answer was to stoop down and kiss her brother's forehead.

Another week brought Guy's renewal of the correspondence.

'Amy, here is something for you to read,' said Charles, holding up the letter as she came into the room.

She knew the writing. 'Wait one moment, Charlie, dear;' and she ran out of the room, found her mother fortunately alone, and said, averting her face,--'Mamma, dear, do you think I ought to let Charlie show me that letter?'

Mrs. Edmonstone took hold of her hand, and drew her round so as to look into the face through its veiling curls. The hand shook, and the face was in a glow of eagerness. 'Yes, dearest!' said she, for she could not help it; and then, as Amy ran back again, she asked herself whether it was foolish, and bad for her sweet little daughter, then declared to herself that it must--it should--it would come right.

There was not a word of Amy in the letter, but it, or something else, made her more bright and cheerful than she had been for some time past.

It seemed as if the lengthening days of January were bringing renewed comfort with them, when Charles, who ever since October had been confined to bed, was able to wear the Chinese dressing-gown, be lifted to a couch, and wheeled into the dressing-room, still prostrate, but much enjoying the change of scene, which he called coming into the world.

These were the events at quiet Hollywell, while Redclyffe was still engrossed with the s.h.i.+pwreck, which seemed to have come on purpose to enliven and occupy this solitary winter. It perplexed the Ashfords about their baronet more than ever. Mr. Ashford said that no one whose conscience was not clear could have confronted danger as he had done; and yet the certainty that he was under a cloud, and the sadness, so inconsistent with his age and temperament still puzzled them. Mrs.