‘It is what I should like best of all,’ Phœbe said, fervently.
‘If we can deserve to bear it,’ he gravely added.
And something in his tone made Honora feel confident that, even if he should set up an engine-house, it would be only if Humfrey would have done so in his place.
‘It will be belonging to you all the more,’ said Phœbe. ‘It is one great pleasure that now I shall have a right to you!’
‘Yes, Phœbe, the old woman will depend on you, her “Eastern moon brightening as day’s wild lights decline.” But she will trouble you no longer. Finish your walk with Humfrey.’ It was the first time she had called him by that name.
‘No,’ they said, with one voice, ‘we were waiting to walk home with you, if we may.’
There was something in that walk, in the tender, respectful kindness with which she was treated, in the intelligent interest that Humfrey showed in the estate, his clear-headed truthfulness on the need of change, and his delicate deference in proposing alteration, that set her heart at rest, made her feel that the ‘goodly heritage’ was in safe hands, and that she had a staff in her hands for the first time since that Sunday in harvest.
* * * * *
Before the next harvest, Hiltonbury bells rang out, and the church was crowded with glad faces; but there was none more deeply joyful than that of the lonely woman with silvery hair, who quietly knelt beside the gray slab, lettered H. C., 1840, convinced that the home and people of him who lay there would be in trusty hands, when she should join him in his true inheritance. Her idols set aside, she could with clearer eyes look to that hope, though in no weariness of earth, no haste to depart, but still in full strength, ready to work for man’s good and God’s glory.
Beside her, as usual, was Owen, leaning on his crutch, but eminent in face and figure as the handsomest man present, and full of animation, betraying neither pain or regret, but throughout the wedding festivities showing himself the foremost in mirth, and spurring Hiltonbury on to rejoicings that made the villagers almost oblivious of the Forest Show.