"Have all what?" he replied. "Margaret, I think you fail to see the difficulties of my position. In the first place, my father is on his deathbed!"
"Oh, John, I am sorry for that."
"And, then, my mother is very bitter about all this. And how can I, at such a time, tell her that her opinion is to go for nothing? I am bound to think of my own children, and cannot abandon my claim to the property."
"No one wants you to abandon it. At least, I do not."
"What am I to do, then? This Mr Maguire is making charges against me."
"Oh, John!"
"He is saying that I am robbing you, and trying to cover the robbery by marrying you. Both my own lawyer, and Mr Slow, have told me that a plain statement of the whole case must be prepared, so that any one who cares to inquire may learn the whole truth, before I can venture to do anything which might otherwise compromise my character. You do not think of all this, Margaret, when you are angry with me." Margaret, hanging down her head, confessed that she had not thought of it.
"The difficulty would have been less, had you remained at the Cedars."
Then she again lifted her head, and told him that that would have been impossible. Let things go as they might, she knew that she had been right in leaving her aunt's house.
There was not much more said between them, nor did he give her any definite promise as to when he would see her again. He told her that she might draw on Mr Slow for money if she wanted it, but that she again declined. And he told her also not to withdraw Susanna Mackenzie from her school at Littlebath—at any rate, not for the present; and intimated also that Mr Slow would pay the schoolmistress's bill. Then he took his leave of her. He had spoken no word of love to her; but yet she felt, when he was gone, that her case was not as hopeless now as it had seemed to be that morning.