Then the wakened-up husband placed a billet or two of wood on his expiring fire, and coaxed it to a cheerful blaze before he again spoke.
All this time Sarah was sobbing out her griefs—whatever they were—and declaring (a very fertile theme of complaining with her) how badly she had been treated by Uncle Matthew and her aunt, and Elizabeth, in times gone by.
"So you were, my darling," John acquiesced, as he ceased blowing the fire with the breath of his mouth, in which operation the wood smoke had puffed out into his face end half-blinded him. "So you were," said he, drawing another chair to the fireside, and seating himself. "But why do you trouble about it? That's all past and gone, years ago. Or—" and then he caught sight again of the open letter Sarah held in her hand—"or, has any one of them been writing to you?"
"No, no; worse than that, John. He has been writing to me; he, his very self. Oh, why can't he let me alone?"
"Do you mean that that letter is from your cousin in Australia, my dear?"
"Yes, that is what it is."
"Well, my pretty, I don't know why he should not write to you. He writes no harm, does he? He is a married man, you know. He does not ask you to run away from your own husband, does he, love?" asked John, gravely, but not without a gleam of humour, perhaps, on his countenance.
"How should I know what he writes?" cried Sarah, piteously.
"Have you not read the letter, then?" Tincroft asked, wonderingly.
"Read it! Read it! No, I should think not, John. You don't think I could ever be so wicked, John, as to read a letter from him, do you?"