“You needn’t sigh, Silas,” his wife remarked. “They may return. Wonders never cease.”
“Return?” repeated Silas, with a broken-hearted kind of a laugh, “Nay, nay, nay, we’ll meet them no more in this world. Poor Rory! He was my favourite. Dear boy, I think I see him yet, with his fair, laughing face, and that rogue of an eye of his.”
Rat-tat.
Silas started.
“The postman?” he said; “no, it can’t be. That’s right, little woman, run to the door and see. What! a telegram for me!”
Silas took the missive, and turned it over and over in his hand half a dozen times at least.
“Why, my dear, who can it be from?” he asked with a puzzled look, “and what can it be about? Can you guess, little wife? Eh? can you?”
“If I were you, Silas,” said his wife, quietly, “I’d open it and see.”
“Dear me! to be sure,” cried Silas. “I didn’t think of that. Why, I declare,” he continued, as soon as he had read it, “it is from Arrandoon Castle, and the poor widow, Allan’s mother, wants to see me at once. I’m off, little woman, at once. Get out my best things. The blue pilots, you know. Quick, little woman—quick! Bear a hand! Hurrah!”
Silas Grig didn’t finish that second cup of tea. He was dressed in less than ten minutes, had kissed his wife, and was hurrying away to the station. Indeed, Silas had never in his life felt in such a hurry before.