Part 15 (1/2)

”No. I never asked him. I don't think he knew. It was in a note that I got from--your son.”

”And what did he say?” asked Mrs Calderwood in a little. ”He said I was to come to the pier head before the s.h.i.+p sailed, and that perhaps I might be able to persuade my brother--though he could not. But he came too late. The s.h.i.+p had sailed.”

”Well, we can only wait now till she comes home again.”

”Yes, we can only wait. I am glad he went with--Willie, who will be good to him. That is all my comfort.”

”Yes, Willie will stand his friend whatever happens.” There was no more said, for Marion came dancing in. ”Yes, Mavis dear, your mother says you may come home with me. I must go and see Aunt Jean first, and you will find me there.”

”And, Miss Dawson, take a good rest, and we'll go round by the sea sh.o.r.e. It is so long since I had a walk with you. See the sun is coming out after all.”

”Well,” said Jean nodding and smiling. Then she shook hands with Mrs Calderwood, but they did not linger over their good-byes. Marion turned a wistful look to her mother's face when they were alone. But her mother would not meet it, but hastened her away.

Jean turned towards the pier head, to let the wind from the sea blow her hot cheeks cool, before she came into her aunt's sight, and as she went she was saying to herself,--

”It was May she was thinking about I could not speak, because May has never spoken to me. And after all--I dare say she is right. 'The sense and courage to keep silence.' No wonder that his mother should say that, who can never forget her poor bonny Elsie.”

It was mid-day--the hour when the usual frequenters of the pier head were home at their dinners, and Jean stood alone for some time looking out to the sea, and thinking her own thoughts. They were troubled thoughts enough. ”The sense and courage to keep silence.” Her temptation was not to speech. It was sense and courage to speak that she needed.

Her aunt too had told her that silence was best--that foolish fancies, that might have vanished otherwise, sometimes took shape and became troubles when put into words. All at once it came into Jean's mind, that it could not have been of her brother's loss, but of something quite different that her aunt had been thinking when she said this.

Could it have been of May and Willie Calderwood?

”She too must think that my father would never yield, and that it would be just the same sad story over again. But still, I am not sure that silence is best.”

By and by those who worked or loitered on the pier head, came dropping back in twos and threes, and Jean knew that unless she would keep her aunt's dinner waiting she must go. Miss Jean had said to herself that the first word spoken would reveal to the girl her own sad secret. But it had not done so--or she would not acknowledge it--even though the remembrance of Mrs Calderwood's words and manner brought a sudden hot colour to her face.

”It was May she was thinking about,” she repeated, as she went down the street.

She looked ”bonny and bright--a sicht for sair e'en,” Nannie, her aunt's maid, said, when she came in. She did not stay very long. She had intended to spend the day, but Marion Calderwood was going home with her, and she would have to come another day, she told her aunt.

Indeed Marion came in before dinner was over, and Jean was glad to have a long walk and the young girl's gay companions.h.i.+p, rather than an afternoon of quiet under her aunt's keen, though loving, eyes.

CHAPTER ELEVEN.

A VISITOR.

Mr Dawson was longer away than he had intended to be when he left. A visit was made to the Corbetts on the way, and from thence came a letter telling Jean to prepare to receive another visitor when her father should return. Hugh, the Corbett who came next after Emily, a schoolboy of fourteen, had been so unfortunate as to hurt his knee in some of his holiday wanderings during the previous summer, and had been a prisoner in the house for months, and Mr Dawson proposed to bring him to Portie for a change.

Jean was promised no pleasure from the visit. The lad was ill, and ”ill to do with,” irritable and impatient of his long confinement in the house. There was little enough s.p.a.ce in the Corbett house for those who were well, and it would do the lad good to see something else besides the four walls of the rather dim parlour where he had been a prisoner so long. He must be a prisoner even at Saughleas for a time, poor lad; but when the spring came so that he could get out, and get the good of the sea air, he would doubtless be better; and in the mean time, said her father, Jean must make the best of him.

The next letter was from London, telling of their safe arrival, and kind reception, but neither that nor the next, told the day on which Mr Dawson might be expected home. Indeed it told nothing in a very satisfactory manner; but Jean gathered that they found themselves in very favourable circ.u.mstances for seeing many of the wonderful sights of London, and the only thing they seemed to regret was, that Jean was not there to enjoy it all with them. A good many names of people and places were mentioned, but no very clear idea was conveyed with regard to them all, and Jean was advised to wait patiently for her father's return to hear more; and this she was content to do.

Her father came home the better for his trip, Jean saw at the first glimpse she got of his face. Of course the first minutes were given to care of the lame boy, who was tired and shy, but when he had got his tea, and was happily disposed of for the night, Jean sat down to hear what her father had to tell. Not that she expected to hear much at any one time. His news would come out by little and little on unexpected occasions, as was his way with news, but he answered her questions about her sister, and her friends, and gave his opinion of them and their manner of life readily enough. He had evidently enjoyed his stay among them, and acknowledged that he had known nothing of London before this visit.

Jean listened, pleased and interested; but all the time she was waiting to hear a certain name which had occurred more than once in the brief letters of her sister, and which had also been mentioned once at least by her father.

”And you went to the British Museum?” said she at last.

”Yes. I had been there before, but this was different. It is one thing to wander about, looking at things which you don't understand, till eyes and mind and body grow weary,--and never a clear idea of any thing gotten, to keep and carry away to look at afterwards--and it is quite another thing to go about in the company of one who, by two or three words, can put life and spirit into all there is to see. Mr Manners was with us that day.”