Into the Highways and Hedges

by F. F. Montrésor

"Oh we allus bully her when th' husband's away," he said. "We mind there's noan to look to her then, an' we make the moast on it: but that's our business; which in this part we stick to, an' let other foalk's affairs bide. Will 'ee have some more cider, sir?"

The preacher's wife looked from one man to the other in some anxiety.

"Why do you say that, Tom? it isn't true!" she cried. "You are all very kind to me!" And Mr. Sauls, meeting the look, shrugged his shoulders, and accepted the cider and the snub peaceably. He hadn't followed her in order to make life harder for her, or even in order to quarrel with her relatives-in-law.

She took him to a deserted mill after dinner, for he had hinted that he had news he preferred giving her alone. And there, under the black walls of the old ruin, with the marshes round them, he told her of her old uncle's illness and death—with more feeling than, perhaps, most people would have given George Sauls credit for.

"He slipped out of life, much as he used to slip out of a dinner-party, with no fuss, giving no trouble to any one," George said. "I had been to see him every day during the last week; for after—well, after you left, the old fellow seemed to have a sort of liking for me. One afternoon I found him on the sofa, instead of in his armchair, too feeble to sit up, and only able to whisper. I insisted on fetching a doctor, but he would not have his wife disturbed, and I saw no reason to send for her. She was out driving, and expected back in time for dinner. Mr. Russelthorpe fell into a doze, as the afternoon wore on. He was quite unable to read, but he had begged me to take down one volume after another, and he kept fingering them, and they were all piled round him on the sofa and on the table by his side. Presently he opened his eyes. 'Plenty of company,' he said; 'but you are the only bit of flesh and blood, Sauls, among them all, except Meg, who cries to me—and I didn't help!' And then he slept again. His hand was in mine (flesh and blood is what one clings to at the end, I suppose, and books must give rather thin comfort); I felt it grow cold while I held it; but he was often very cold. I stooped over him to listen to his breathing, but not a sound was to be heard. He was gone."

Mr. Sauls paused for a minute; his liking for Mr. Russelthorpe had been closely bound up with the love that was—unfortunately, he told himself—the love of his life. He saw Meg was touched by his story, and especially by her uncle's self-reproach. Yet the old man had done nothing; and he, who would have done anything, who would have moved heaven and earth for her in his youthful energy, had she only appealed to him, would never touch her at all.

"That, however, is not the really important part of my news," he went on, with a slight change of tone. "The point of it is that you have come in for a fortune—though only on certain conditions."

He explained the conditions at some length; he generally spoke concisely, but there was no need to hurry this interview.

"He was very good to me when I was a little girl," Meg softly said at last, when every detail had been made clear. "When I grew up I fancied he did not care what happened to me. I spoke to him unkindly the last time I saw him. I wish! oh, how I wish I hadn't! So he remembered me after all!"

"To some purpose," said George drily. It was like Meg to be more impressed by the remembrance than by the actual money; and the dryness of his tone made her smile.