“Mary and Fanny, go to bed,” said their mother, decidedly, when lights were brought. “Sydney, bid your cousins good-night, and then come with me; I want to ask you a question.”
“Good-night already, mother! Why, it is not time yet this half-hour.”
“It is enough that I choose you to go to bed. Wish your cousins good-night, and come with me.”
Mrs Grey led the way once more into the store-room, followed, rather sulkily, by Sydney.
“What can all this be about?” whispered Hester to Margaret. “There is always something going on which we are not to know.”
“Some affair of fruit, or wine, or bonbons, perhaps, which are all the better for making their appearance unexpectedly.”
At this moment Sophia and her mother entered by opposite doors. Sophia’s eyes were red; and there was every promise in her face that the slightest word spoken to her would again open the sluices of her tears. Mrs Grey’s countenance was to the last degree dismal: but she talked—talked industriously, of everything she could think of. This was the broadest possible hint to the sisters not to inquire what was the matter; and they therefore went on sewing and conversing very diligently till they thought they might relieve Mrs Grey by offering to retire. They hesitated only because Mr Grey had not come in; and he so regularly appeared at ten o’clock, that they had never yet retired without having enjoyed half an hour’s chat with him.
“Sophia, my dear,” said her mother, “are the night candles there? Light your cousins’ candles.—I am sure they are wishing to go; and it is getting late. You will not see Mr Grey to-night, my dears. He has been sent for to a distance.”
At this moment, the scrambling of a horse’s feet was heard on the gravel before the front door. Sophia looked at her mother, and each lighted a candle precipitately, and thrust it into a hand of each cousin.
“There, go, my dears,” said Mrs Grey. “Never mind stopping for Mr Grey. I will deliver your good-night to him. You will have to be rather early in the morning, you know. Good-night, good-night.”