"Like a chainèd thing, caressed
By the hand it knows the best,
By the hand which, day by day,
Visits its imprisoned stay,
Bringing gifts of fruit and blossom
From the green earth's plenteous bosom;
All but that for which it pines,
In these narrow, close confines,
With a sad and ceaseless sigh,—
Wild and wingèd Liberty!"
With a deep inspiration which was the farewell to more hopeful dreams than he knew, until then, he had nursed, he collected his senses to reply.
"It was my intention to take Jessie to Dundee in June, at the beginning of my vacation. She set the time herself—I can see now, in compliance with what she believed were my wishes. But she shall go at once. I thank you for your more than friendly concern for her, your frank dealing with me."
He arose to go. The lady scanned his face somewhat uneasily. There was something there that foiled her penetration.
"You understand, my dear sir, that nothing would have tempted me to intermeddle in this affair, were the case precisely what you have supposed. But there is an undercurrent, Mr. Fordham, the effect of which I can trace, that seriously complicates anything like hysterical depression. And loving the child as we do—as every one does, it behooves us to watch her warily, minister to her intelligently as tenderly. The affection between the sisters is unusually strong, and we should remember that the dear lamb has known no other mother."
"I have offered, several times during the winter, to take her to visit Eunice. We were to have gone at Christmas, but Jessie had a severe cold that confined her to the house a fortnight."
"I remember! To be quite sincere with you—not that I consider it a dangerous symptom—but I wish she were rid of that little hacking cough. She makes light of it. Says it is nervous, or from the stomach. But I do not like it!"
She attended him to the portico, disclaiming, cautioning, and thanking him,—gesticulating through it all—as the wickedest of the wicked quintette of observers had it—"like a lunatic windmill." They espied no change in the Professor's gait or air. He walked firmly, head erect and countenance composed. And their distance from him was too great to allow them to note the want of color in his complexion.
He entered his own house, more slowly than he had trodden the pavement. Jessie had fallen into the habit common to wives who hail their husbands' return as cheering events, of meeting him in the hall, sometimes at the front door. She appeared from the sitting-room, while he was hanging up his hat and dusting his boots. He was particular in all that pertained to personal neatness.
"Your step sounds weary," she said. "It is very warm, really debilitating, to-day—is it not?"