“But I don’t want it, Mary,” I protested, “and I’m not hungry.”
“Then I do, and I am,” she said, smiling. “You won’t mind having a cup with me, I know, Master Antony dear. Just like old times.”
“Well, I will try,” I said, “and I dare say Revitts will be back by then.”
Mary glanced at the little Dutch clock in the corner, and saw that it pointed to eleven; then, shaking her head, she said sadly:
“No, I don’t think he’ll come back.”
“But you don’t think he has run away, Mary?”
“I don’t know what to think, my dear,” she said; “I only hope that he won’t come to any harm, poor boy. It’s his poor head, and that’s why he turned so strange.”
“Yes,” I said joyfully, as I saw that at last she had taken the common-sense view of the case, “that’s it, depend upon it, Mary; and if he does not come soon, we’ll give notice to the police, and they’ll find him out.”
“No, my dear, don’t do that,” she said piteously; “it would be like shaming the poor boy; for if his mates got to know that he had run away like on his wedding-day, he’d never hear the last of it.”
I was obliged to agree in the truth of this remark, and I began to realise then, in spite of poor Mary’s rough exterior and ignorance, what a depth of patient endurance and thoughtfulness there was in the nature of a woman. Her first outburst of uncontrollable grief past, she was ready to sit down and patiently bear her load of sorrow, waiting for what more trouble might come; for I am fully convinced that the poor woman looked forward to no pleasure in her married life. In spite of her belief that her husband’s strange conduct was in some way due to his late accident, she felt convinced that he was regretting his marriage, and, if that were so now, she had no hope of winning him to a better state.