"But you'll have seen him many a time since?"
"Well, no, I ain't. Many the time as he's been coming down but something always come between. Once he had fixed the very day and all, and then he were called off on business to Brighton or somewhere. That were a terrible disappointment to the boy; my heart were that sore for him as I nearly forgot how much I'd been longing for it myself."
"But he'll have wrote?"
"Bless you, yes! he's a terrible one for his mother, he is. He've not written so much of late maybe; but then folks is that busy in London they hasn't the time to do things as we has in the country; but I'll warrant he've written to me every time he had a spare moment; and so when I sees old Giles the postman come up, and I says, 'Anything for me, master?' and he says, 'Nothing for you to-day, mum' (for I were always respected in Sunnybrook from a girl up), I think to myself, thinks I, 'it ain't for the want of the will as my Laddie hasn't wrote.' And then the presents as he'd send me, bless his heart! Bank notes it were at first, till he found as I just paid 'em into the bank and left 'em there; for what did I want with bank notes? And then he sent me parcels of things, silk gownds fit for a duchess, and shawls all the colors of the rainbow, till I almost began to think he'd forgot what sort of an old body I be. Just to think of the likes of me in such fine feathers! And there were flannel enough for a big family, and blankets; and then he sent tea and sugar, I don't know how many pounds of it; but it were good and no mistake, and I'd like a cup of it now for you and me, my dear."
"And have he sent for you now to come and live with him?"
"No, he don't know nothing about it; and I mean to take him all by surprise. Old Master Heath, as my cottage belonged to, died this summer; and the man as took his farm wants my cottage for his shepherd, and he give me notice to quit. I felt it a bit and more, for I'd been in that cottage thirty-five year, spring and fall, and I knows every crack and cranny about it, and I fretted terrible at first; but at last I says to myself, 'Don't you go for to fret; go right off to Laddie, and he'll make a home for you and glad;' and so I just stored my things away and come right off."
"He've been doing well in London?"
"Well, my Laddie's a gentleman! He's a regular doctor, and keeps a carriage, and has a big house and servants. Mr. Mason, our parish doctor, says as he's one of the first doctors in London, and that I may well be proud of him. Bless me! how pleased the boy will be to see his old mother! Maybe I shall see him walking in the streets, but if I don't I'll find his house and creep in at the back door so as he sha'n't see me, and tell the gal to say to the doctor (doctor, indeed! my Laddie!) as some one wants to see him very particular. And then"—The old woman broke down here, half-sobbing, half-laughing, with an anticipation too tenderly, ecstatically sweet for words. "My dear," she said, as she wiped her brimming eyes, "I've thought of it and dreamt of it so long, and to think as I should have lived to see it!"
The expectations of her travelling companion were far less bright, though she had youth to paint the future with bright hopes, and only nineteen winters to throw into the picture dark shadows of foreboding. She had been well brought up, and gone into comfortable service; and her life had run on in a quiet, happy course till she met with Harry Joyce.
"Folks says all manner of ill against him," said the girl's trembling voice; "but he were always good to me. I didn't know much about him, except as he liked me, and I liked him dearly; for he come from London at fair-time, and he stopped about the place doing odd jobs, and he come after me constant. My mistress were sore set against him, but I were pretty near mad about him; so we was married without letting any folks at home know naught about it. Oh, yes! we was married all right. I've got my lines, as I could show you as there wasn't no mistake about it; and it were all happy enough for a bit, and he got took on as ostler at the George; and there wasn't a steadier, better-behaved young feller in the place. But, oh, dear! it didn't last long. He came in one day and said as how he'd lost his place, and was going right off to London to get work there. I didn't say never a word, but I got up and begun to put our bits of things together; and then he says as he'd best go first and find a place for me, and I must go home to my mother. I thought it would have broke my heart, I did, to part with him; but he stuck to it, and I went home. Our village is nigh upon eight mile from Merrifield, and I'd never heard a word from mother since I wrote to tell them I was wed. When I got home that day, I almost thought as they'd have shut the door on me. A story had got about as I wasn't married at all, and had brought shame and trouble on my folks; and my coming home like that made people talk all the more, though I showed them my lines and told my story truthful. Well, mother took me in, and I bided there till my baby was born; and she and father was good to me, I'll not say as they wasn't; but they were always uneasy and suspicious-like about Harry; and I got sick of folks looking and whispering, as if I ought to be ashamed when I had naught to be ashamed of. And I wrote to Harry more than once to say as I'd rather come to him, if he'd a hole to put me in; and he always wrote to bid me bide a bit longer, till baby come; and then I just wrote and said I must come anyhow, and so set off! But, oh! I feel skeered to think of London, and Harry maybe not glad to see me."