She did make the effort. With desperate steadiness she stepped into the boat where Mrs Grey was seated. She was conscious that Philip watched to see what she would do, and then seated Maria and himself in the other boat. Hope followed Margaret. If he had been in the same boat with Enderby, the temptation to throw him overboard would have been too strong.
Till they were past the weir and the lock, and all the erections belonging to the village, and to the great firm which dignified it, the boats were rowed. Conversation went on. The grey church steeple was pronounced picturesque, as it rose above the trees; and the children looked up at Dr Levitt, as if the credit of it by some means belonged to him, the rector. Sydney desired his younger sisters not to trail their hands through the water, as it retarded the passage of the boat. The precise distance of the ruins from Deerbrook ferry was argued, and Dr Levitt gave some curious traditions about the old abbey they were going to see. Then towing took the place of rowing, and the party became very quiet. The boat cut steadily through the still waters, the slight ripple at the bows being the only sound which marked its progress. Dr Levitt pointed with his stick to the “verdurous wall” which sprang up from the brink of the river, every spray of the beech, every pyramid of the larch, every leaf of the oak, and the tall column of the occasional poplar, reflected true as the natural magic of light and waters could make them. Some then wished the sun would come out, without which it could scarcely be called seeing the woods. Others tried to recognise the person who stood fishing under the great ash; and it took a minute or two to settle whether it was a man or a boy; and two minutes more to decide that it was nobody belonging to Deerbrook. Margaret almost wondered that Edward could talk on about these things as he did—so much in his common tone and manner. But for his ease and steadiness in small talk, she should suppose he was striving to have her left unnoticed, to look down into the water as strenuously as she pleased. She little knew what a training he had had in wearing his usual manner while his heart was wretched.
“There, now!” cried Fanny, “we have passed the place—the place where cousin Margaret fell in last winter. We wanted to have gone directly over it.”
Margaret looked up, and caught Sydney’s awe-struck glance. He had not yet recovered from that day.
“If you had mentioned it sooner,” said Margaret, “I could have shown you the very place. We did pass directly over it.”
“Oh, why did you not tell us? You should have told us.”
Dr Levitt smiled as he remarked that he thought Miss Ibbotson was likely to be the last person to point out that spot to other people, as well as to forget it herself. Margaret had indeed been far from forgetting it. She had looked down into its depths, and had brought thence something that had been useful to her—something on which she was meditating when Fanny spoke. She had been saved, and doubtless for a purpose. If it was only to suffer for her own part, and to find no rest and peace but in devoting herself to others—this was a high purpose. Maria could live, and was thankful to live, without home, or family, or prospect. But it was not certain that this was all that was to be done and enjoyed in life. Something dreadful had happened: but Philip loved her: he still loved her—for nothing but agonised love could have inspired the glance which yet thrilled through her. There was some mistake—some fearful mistake; and the want of confidence in her which it revealed—the fault of temper in him—opened a long perspective of misery; but yet, he loved her, and all was not over. At times she felt certain that Mrs Rowland was at the bottom of this new injury: but it was inconceivable that Philip should be deluded by her, after his warnings, and his jealous fears lest his Margaret should give heed to any of his sister’s misrepresentations. No light shone upon the question, from the cloudy sky above, or the clear waters beneath; but both yielded comfort through that gentle law by which things eminently real—Providence, the mercy of death, and the blessing of godlike life, are presented or prophesied to the spirit by the shadows amidst which we live. When Margaret spoke, there was a calmness in her voice, so like an echo of comfort in her heart, that it almost made Edward start.
The party in the other boat were noisier, whether or not they were happier, than those in whose wake they followed. Mr Walcot had begun to be inspired as soon as the oars had made their first splash, and was now reciting to Sophia some “Lines to the Setting Sun,” which he had learned when a little boy, and had never forgotten. He asked her whether it was not a sweet idea—that of the declining sun being like a good man going to his rest, to rise again to-morrow morning. Sophia was fond of poetry that was not too difficult; and she found little disinclination in herself now to observe her father’s directions about being civil to Mr Walcot. The gentleman perceived that he had won some advantage; and he persevered. He next spoke of the amiable poet, Cowper, and was delighted to find that Miss Grey was acquainted with some of his writings; that she had at one time been able to repeat his piece on a Poplar Field, and those sweet lines beginning—
“The rose had been washed, just washed in a shower.”
But she had never heard the passage about “the twanging horn o’er yonder bridge,” and “the wheeling the sofa round,” and “the cups that cheer but not inebriate;” so Mr Walcot repeated them, not, as before, in a high key, and with his face turned up towards the sky, but almost in a whisper, and inclining towards her ear. Sophia sighed, and thought it very beautiful, and was sorry for people who were not fond of poetry. A pause of excited feeling followed, during which they found that the gentlemen were questioning a boatman, who was awaiting his turn to tow, about the swans in the river.