“But when your brother gets a house of his own, he’ll be taking a wife,” said Robert gravely.
“Surely! I would like that well.”
“Oh! it will come whether you like it or no. If he canna get one, he’ll get another—there’s no fear.”
“Ah! but if he canna get the right one, he should take none. And he would ay have me.”
Robin might have had his own thoughts about that matter. He said nothing, however, but that night he wrote a letter to his mother. He wrote about various matters, as once every week it was his duty and pleasure to do. And when he had said all else that was to be said, he added, that Allison Bain whiles looked as she used to look in her first days in Nethermuir—as though she had lost all her friends, and as though she might lose herself next.
“I told her to-night that her best wisdom would be to come away with me to America. I meant, of course, that I would go with her if she was afraid to go by herself. For they say there are fine colleges in America, and I could keep on with my work there. Allison is getting no good here, among her auld wives.”
Mrs Hume smiled at Robert’s proposal, and so did the minister, but they both looked grave at his account of Allison.
“It is a pity that she refuses to come here for a few weeks,” said Mr Hume.
“Yes, it might do her good. Still it would not be as it was at first. It was because her hands were busy and her days full, that she was helped then. It would be different now. And more than that, she seems quite to shrink from the thought of it. We will wait a while, and all that may pass away.”