‘In the train—intending to go to Malta,’ said Ulick.
‘I didn’t know I could not; I didn’t mean to vex you, Sophy,’ continued the child. ‘I’m come home now, and I wont try again.’
‘Oh! Maurice, what would have become of you?’ She held out her hand to Ulick, the first time for months.
‘And we’ve got a letter for you, proceeded Maurice.
Ulick would fain have withheld it, but he had not the choice. She caught at it, still holding Maurice fast, and ere he could propose her opening it in the carriage while he walked home she had torn it open, and the same moment she had sunk down, seated on the path, with an arm round her brother. ‘Oh! Maurice, it is well you are here! You would not have found them—it is over!’
She had found one brother to lose the other; but the relief of Maurice’s safety had so softened the blow, that her tears gushed forth freely.
The sense of Ulick’s presence restrained her, but raising her head, she missed him, and felt lonely, desolate, deserted, almost fainting, and in a strange place.
‘Is he dead?’ said Maurice, in a solemn low voice, and she wept helplessly, while the little fellow stood sustaining her weight like a small pillar, perplexed and dismayed.
‘Are you poorly, Sophy? What shall I do?’ said he, as she almost fell back, but a stronger arm held her up.
‘Lean on me, dear Sophy,’ said Ulick, who had returned, bringing some water from a small house near at hand, and supported her and soothed her like a brother.