Now, we are not forgetting the letter at Sarah's elbow; nor did she forget it either; for no sooner had the handmaid departed to "finish her work upstairs," as she said, than the indifference disappeared, and gave place to a kind of indolent curiosity to know who in the world should have taken the trouble to write to her.
In another moment she had hastily wiped her hands and taken up the letter, and then—but what follows requires a new chapter.
[CHAPTER XXII.]
A LETTER FROM AUSTRALIA.
JOHN had not moved from his easy-chair by the study-fire, where we just now left him. His thoughts were wandering far-away, perhaps; or he might have been cogitating a new chapter in the particular work on which he had been some time engaged. Whatever the subject of his meditations, they had been so engrossing that his fire had dwindled down to a handful of embers, and he had been oblivious of the postman's horn-blast and ring.
From these meditations, he was suddenly roused by the entrance of his wife, in such a state of agitation that even he, absorbed as he was, took alarm.
"My dear love, what is the matter? What has happened?" he exclaimed, hastily looking up, and glancing first at Sarah's pale face, then at her white linen apron, and lastly at an open letter she held in the hand which bore traces of its late interesting occupation.
"John Tincroft, did I ever deceive you?" said poor Sarah, with a great sob.