Part 35 (2/2)

How bore up Maria Hastings? None could know the dread, the grief, that was at work within her, or the deep love she felt for George G.o.dolphin.

Her nights were sleepless, her days were restless; she lost her appet.i.te, her energy, almost her health. Mrs. Hastings wondered what was wrong with her, and hoped Maria was not going to be one of those sickly ones who always seem to fade in the spring.

Maria could speak out her sorrow to none. Grace would not have sympathized with any feeling so strong, whose object was George G.o.dolphin. And had Grace sympathized ever so, Maria would not have spoken it. She possessed that shrinking reticence of feeling, that refined sensitiveness, to which betraying its own emotions to another would be little less than death. Maria could not trust her voice to ask after him: when Mr. Hastings or her brothers would come in and say (as they had more than once), ”There's a report in the town that George G.o.dolphin's dead,” she could not press upon them her eager questions, and ask, ”Is it likely to be true? Are there any signs that it is true?”

Once, when this rumour came in, Maria made an excuse to go out: some trifle to be purchased in the town, she said to Mrs. Hastings: and went down the street inwardly s.h.i.+vering, too agitated to notice acquaintances whom she met. Opposite the bank, she stole glances up at its private windows, and saw that the blinds were down. In point of fact, this told nothing, for the blinds had been kept down much since George's illness, the servants not troubling themselves to draw them up: but to the fears of Maria Hastings, it spoke volumes. Sick, trembling, she continued her way mechanically: she did not dare to stop, even for a moment, or to show, in her timidity, as much as the anxiety of an indifferent friend.

At that moment Mr. Snow came out of the house, and crossed over.

Maria stopped then. Surely she might halt to speak to the surgeon without being suspected of undue interest in Mr. George G.o.dolphin. She even brought out the words, as Mr. Snow shook hands with her: ”You have been to the bank?”

”Yes, poor fellow; he is in a critical state,” was Mr. Snow's answer.

”But I think there's a faint indication of improvement, this afternoon.”

In the revulsion of feeling which the words gave, Maria forgot her caution. ”He is not dead, then?” she exclaimed, all too eagerly, her face turning to a glowing crimson, her lips apart with emotion.

Mr. Snow gathered in the signs, and a grave expression stole over his lips. But the next minute he was smiling openly. ”No, he is not dead yet, Miss Maria; and we must see what we can do towards keeping him alive.” Maria turned home again with a beating and a thankful heart.

A weary, weary summer for George G.o.dolphin--a weary, weary illness. It was more than two months before he rose from his bed at all, and it was nearly two more before he went down the stairs of the dwelling-house. A fine, balmy day it was, that one in June, when George left his bed for the first time, and was put in the easy-chair, wrapped up in blankets.

The sky was blue, the sun was warm, and bees and b.u.t.terflies sported in the summer air. George turned his weary eyes, weary with pain and weakness, towards the cheering signs of outdoor life, and wondered whether he should ever be abroad again.

It was August before that time came. Early in that month the close carriage of Ashlydyat waited at the door, to give Mr. George his first airing. A shadowy object he looked, Mr. Snow on one side of him, Margery on the other; Janet, who would be his companion in the drive, following.

They got him downstairs between them, and into the carriage. From that time his recovery, though slow, was progressive, and in another week he was removed for change to Ashlydyat. He could walk abroad then with two sticks, or with a stick and somebody's arm. George, who was getting up his spirits wonderfully, declared that he and his sticks should be made into a picture and sent to the next exhibition of native artists.

One morning, he and his sticks were sunning themselves in the porch at Ashlydyat, when a stranger approached and accosted him. A gentlemanly-looking man, in a straw hat, with a light travelling overcoat thrown upon his arm. George looked a gentleman also, in spite of his dilapidated health and his sticks, and the stranger raised his hat with something of foreign urbanity.

”Does Mr. Verrall reside here?”

”No,” replied George.

A hard, defiant sort of expression rose immediately to the stranger's face. It almost seemed to imply that George was deceiving him: and his next words bore out the impression. ”I have been informed that he does reside here,” he said, with a stress upon the ”does.”

”He did reside here,” replied George G.o.dolphin: ”but he does so no longer. That is where Mr. Verrall lives,” he added, pointing one of his sticks at the white walls of Lady G.o.dolphin's Folly.

The stranger wheeled round on his heel, took a survey of it, and then lifted his hat again, apparently satisfied. ”Thank you, sir,” he said.

”The mistake was mine. Good morning.”

George watched him away as he strode with a firm, quick, elastic step towards the Folly. George wondered when he should walk again with the same step. Perhaps the idea, or the desire to do so, impelled him to try it then. He rose from his seat and went tottering out, drawing his sticks with him. It was a tempting morning, and George strolled on in its brightness, resting now on one bench, now on another, and then bearing on again.

”I might get as far as the Folly, if I took my time,” he said to himself. ”Would it not be a surprise to them!”

So he bore onwards to the Folly, as the stranger had done. He was drawing very near to it, was seated, in fact, on the last bench that he intended to rest on, when Mr. Verrall pa.s.sed him.

”Have you had a gentleman inquiring for you?” George asked him.

”What gentleman?” demanded Mr. Verrall.

<script>