'Then may God help him!' said Mrs. Woodward, gently caressing her daughter, who was still sobbing with her face buried in her mother's lap. 'May God Almighty lighten the blow to him! But oh, Gertrude, I had hoped, I had so hoped——'
'Oh, mamma, don't, pray don't,' and Gertrude sobbed as though she were going into hysterics.
'No, my child, I will not say another word. Dear as he is to me, you are and must be ten times dearer. There, Gertrude, it is over now; over at least between us. We know each other's hearts now. It is my fault that we did not do so sooner.' They did understand each other at last, and the mother made no further attempt to engage her daughter's love for the man she would have chosen as her daughter's husband.
But still the worst was to come, as Mrs. Woodward well knew—and as Gertrude knew also; to come, too, on this very day. Mrs. Woodward, with a woman's keen perception, felt assured that Harry Norman, when he found himself at the Cottage, freed from the presence of the successful candidate, surrounded by the affectionate faces of all her circle, would melt at once and look to his love for consolation. She understood the feelings of his heart as well as though she had read them in a book; and yet she could do nothing to save him from his fresh sorrows. The cup was prepared for him, and it was necessary that he should drink it. She could not tell him, could not tell even him, that her daughter had rejected him, when as yet he had made no offer.
And so Harry Norman hurried down to his fate. When he reached the Cottage, Mrs. Woodward and Linda and Katie were in the drawing-room.
'Harry, my dear Harry,' said Mrs. Woodward, rushing to him, throwing her arms round him, and kissing him; 'we know it all, we understand it all—my fine, dear, good Harry.'
Harry was melted in a moment, and in the softness of his mood kissed Katie too, and Linda also. Katie he had often kissed, but never Linda, cousins though they were. Linda merely laughed, but Norman blushed; for he remembered that had it so chanced that Gertrude had been there, he would not have dared to kiss her.
'Oh, Harry,' said Katie, 'we are so sorry—that is, not sorry about Alaric, but sorry about you. Why were there not two prizes?'
'It's all right as it is, Katie,' said he; 'we need none of us be sorry at all. Alaric is a clever fellow; everybody gave him credit for it before, and now he has proved that everybody is right.'
'He is older than you, you know, and therefore he ought to be cleverer,' said Katie, trying to make things pleasant.