“I began to think he liked me when I was staying with Mrs Manners, and I was sure of it at Saughleas—only afterwards—and even then—” said Marion not very coherently. But she did not explain her meaning more clearly.
“The sooner the better,” Mr Dawson had said, and George said the same, and so did Jean in a few sweet words that came in a day or two, and so did her aunt. Mrs Manners reminded her husband that she had told him of Marion’s conquest of her father on that first day of her visit to them last year, and also that she had foreseen this happy ending. So with all belonging to George so ready to welcome her child among them, and George himself so dear, what could Mrs Calderwood do but be glad also, and give her up with a good grace?
It was not so difficult a matter after all, she found when she had thus determined. And by and by she forgave her daughter for having been too easily won. And the visionary jealousy which had risen within her at the memory of her lost child vanished, though in her heart she doubted whether her poor dead Elsie had ever won such love as George had now to give her sister.
So the marriage day was set. It was not very soon, George thought, but the time was not unreasonably long, and it was hastened a little at the last. Captain Calderwood came home from his second voyage in his own ship sooner than was expected, and his stay was to be shorter than usual. The wedding was to be a very quiet one, and it could be hastened without interfering seriously with preparations. Marion had set her heart on her brother’s being with her, and it was so arranged, and all things went well.
All things but one. At the very last there came from Jean a letter with many good reasons why she could not come with her father and brother, and with many sweet words of love to the girl “whom she would have chosen from all the world to be her sister.” But Mr Dawson was there, intent on doing honour to the occasion, and Mr and Mrs Manners and Captain Saugster of the “John Seaton,” and of all people in the world, Sir Percy Harefield! who did not, it is to be supposed, come without an invitation, but who possibly suggested to Mr Dawson that he would like to receive one.
And all went well. There was no large party and no regular speech-making. The bridegroom said nothing, Captain Calderwood said only, “If he could have chosen a brother out of all the world, he would have chosen no other;” and Mr Dawson remembered the words of Jean’s letter to Marion, which she had shown him before she sent it away. Mr Dawson said a few words, but he was not so happy, because he could not help again expressing a wish that “by-ganes might be by-ganes,” which Mrs Calderwood thought he might have omitted on that day at least.
It came to an end, and the bride and bridegroom went away, and Mr Dawson and Sir Percy Harefield went with Captain Calderwood to see his ship, and they were all very friendly together; so friendly that Sir Percy had thoughts of turning his back on London and the prospective delights of the moors, and taking the voyage with Captain Calderwood to see what the other side of the world was like.
“And what thought ye o’ Willie himself?” asked Miss Jean, when Mr Dawson was telling her all this, after he had been at home a day or two. “Is he likely to be such a man as his father was?”
“There’s mair o’ him than ever there would ha’e been o’ his father, if he had been spared, poor man. He is much thought of by his employers. I thought him stiff at first. But he thawed out and was cordial and kindly after a little. He would have made the Englishman very welcome to go with him, if he had keepit in the same mind till he sailed. But I doubt, as Jean once said o’ him, he would have found him a heavy handfu’ ere a’ was done. I ken no greater misfortune that can befall a man than to have nothing to do in the world.”
“He has his soldiering?”