“No, my dear, no; gently, don’t be in such a hurry,” she said imperatively, having already got up on her hands and knees.
Godfrey put his strong young arms round her, and lifted her on to her feet, holding her carefully, and entreating her to tell him if she was hurt; while she told him sharply not to make a fuss about nothing, even though, to her own great vexation, she was so tremulous as to be obliged to lean on his arm, and let him lead her back to the house.
“No,” she said. “No, I don’t want to lie down, and I don’t want a glass of brandy and water, and I don’t want the doctor. I want to sit down in my chair, and see if my bones are in their right places.”
Jeanie now appeared, fussing about, and very anxious to do the right thing, but the old lady would not even have her bonnet taken off, and hunted the two young people out of sight, asking them if they thought she had had a stroke, just as they were whispering to each other that, at any rate, it was nothing of that sort. They peeped at her from behind the creepers through the open window, and discussed whether they ought to send for the doctor. But, as Godfrey said, he didn’t know if there was a doctor to send for, such a person having rarely been seen within the walls of the Mill House; and, besides, to act for Aunt Waynflete was a new departure which neither dared undertake.
In the mean time, old Margaret, to her own great annoyance, found herself shedding tears. She was more shaken than she had guessed. She dried them rapidly, and then walked cautiously round the room, to see whether she was really herself and unhurt.
“The Lord be praised, there’s no harm done!” she said. “But I’ve had a warning; and, please God, I’ll take it, and prepare for my latter end. I’m an old woman, and should mind my steps, and not be mooning over the future or the past, when I should be picking my way. If my nephew Guy, like others before him, is but poor stuff, Godfrey’s a different sort. I’ll keep my eyes open.”
She appeared to be none the worse for her accident in the anxious if inexperienced eyes of Godfrey and Jeanie, who scarcely dared to ask her how she felt.
The new will was brought to her, and was duly signed and witnessed. She locked it away with the former one, and with other business papers, in a table-drawer in her bedroom. She was prepared now for any emergency; but, in her heart, she was far from satisfied, and, in the solitude of the thoughts of age, she weighed the two young men against each other with a sincere desire to judge them aright. All the settled convictions, and all the saddest experiences of her life, told against Guy. All her affection, all her inclination, swayed towards Godfrey. And yet, angry as she was with her elder nephew, the tones of his voice, the set of his mouth when he had spoken his mind to her, recurred to her keen judgment, and she doubted still.
On the day after the signing of the new will, she received the following answer to her note to Guy.
“Mill House, Ingleby,—
“September 16.
“Dear Aunt Margaret,—
“I shall not, of course, invite my friend to stay in your house again, now that I am aware of your sentiments on the subject; but I will avail myself of your permission to leave matters as they stand for the present, as I should be unwilling to involve myself in so ludicrous an explanation. Family feuds appear to me entirely out of date. I fear I shall not be able to come over to Waynflete at present, as I cannot leave Staunton, and you probably will not care to see him there.
“Your affectionate nephew,—
“Guy Waynflete.”