She reached home by nine o'clock and sat with her mother for an hour, reading out loud some book on which they were then engaged.
"I think I'll go to bed now, mamma," she said.
"You always want to go to bed so soon," said Mrs. Ray. "I think you are getting tired of reading out loud. That will be very sad for me with my eyes."
"No, I'm not, mamma, and I'll go on again for half an hour, if you please; but I thought you liked going to bed at ten."
The watch was consulted, and as it was not quite ten Rachel did go on for another half-hour, and then she went up to her bedroom.
She sat herself down at her open window and looked out for a while upon the heavens. The summer moon was at its full, so that the green before the cottage was as clear before her as in the day, and she could see over into the gloom of Mr. Sturt's farmyard across it. She had once watched Rowan as he came over the turf towards the cottage swinging his stick in his hand, and now she gazed on the spot where the Baslehurst road came in as though she expected that his figure might again appear. She looked and looked, thinking of this, till she would hardly have been surprised had that figure really come forth upon the road. But no figure was to be seen, and after awhile she withdrew from the window and sat herself down at the little table. It was very late when she undressed herself and went to her bed, and later still when her eyes, red with many tears, were closed in sleep;—but the letter had been written and was ready for her mother's inspection. This was the letter as it stood after many struggles in the writing of it,—
Bragg's End,
Thursday, 186—My dear Mr. Rowan,
I am much obliged to you for having written the letter which I received from you the other day, and I should have answered it sooner, only mamma thought it best to see Mr. Comfort first, as he is our clergyman here, and to ask his advice. I hope you will not be annoyed because I showed your letter to mamma, but I could not receive any letter from you without doing so, and I may as well tell you that she will read this before it goes.
And now that I have begun I hardly know how to write what I have to say. Mr. Comfort and mamma have determined that there must be nothing fixed as an engagement between us, and that for the present, at least, I may not correspond with you. This will be my first and last letter. As that will be so, of course I shall not expect you to write any more, and I know that you will be very angry. But if you understood all my feelings I think that perhaps you would not be very, very angry. I know it is true that when you asked me that question, I nodded my head as you say in your letter. If I had sworn the twenty oaths of which you speak they would not, as you say, have bound me tighter. But neither could bind me to anything against mamma's will. I thought that you were very generous to come to me as you did;—oh, so generous! I don't know why you should have looked to such a one as me to be your wife. But I would have done my best to make you happy, had I been able to do as I suppose you then wished me. But you well know that a man is very different from a girl, and of course I must do as mamma wishes.
They say that as the business here about the brewery is so very unsettled they think it probable that you will not have to come back to Baslehurst any more; and that as our acquaintance has been so very short, it is not reasonable to suppose that you will care much about me after a little while. Perhaps it is not reasonable, and after this I shall have no right to be angry with you if you forget me. I don't think you will quite forget me; but I shall never expect or even hope to see you again.
Twice in writing her letter Rachel cut out this latter assertion, but at last, sobbing in despair, she restored the words. What right would she have to hope that he would come to her, after she had taken upon herself to break that promise which had been conveyed to him, when she bent her head over his arm?
I shall not forget you, and I will always be your friend, as you said I should be. Being friends is very different to anything else, and nobody can say that I may not do that.
I will always remember what you showed me in the clouds; and, indeed, I went there this very evening to see if I could see another arm. But there was nothing there, and I have taken that as an omen that you will not come back to Baslehurst.—
"To me," had been the words as she had first written them; but there was tenderness in those words, and she found it necessary to alter them.