"If I were ill, Mrs. Tom, I should trust to you in preference to any doctor ever warranted to kill or cure," said Willard, as he took his hat to go.
Mrs. Tom smiled benignly at the compliment, quite delighted at this tacit acknowledgment of her skill.
And an hour after, Willard and Lem were on their way to Westport.
What were Willard Drummond's thoughts, as, sitting silently in the stern of the boat, he watched the dancing waves flash and sparkle in the sunlight? Very different from those he had indulged not long since, when, on one eventful night, he and Christie had crossed it together. This Laura Courtney, with her pretty, piquant face, and pert, saucy manners, had first won his boyish heart. He had raved, and vowed, and implored at her feet, but she only laughed at him and his passion, and now she had no more power over his heart than if she never existed. Might it not be the same with those he had loved since? Was not his passion for Christie beginning to grow cold already? Would it not grow colder every day? And in the hot ardor of his love he had made this little obscure, uneducated, shy child, his wife. Why, oh, why, had he not waited? And now that the deed was irreparable, where was this to end?
They reached Westport before dark; and Lem, having landed him, set off for the island again, promising to return for him in the morning. The moon was just rising above the pine trees when he reached home; and, on entering the house, the first object he beheld was his young mistress, in close conversation with his mother.
"Lor' sakes, Miss Sibyl! you here!" was Lem's first ejaculation.
"Yes, Lem; and glad to be home again," she answered, gayly. "Aunt Moll tells me you have just been taking Mr. Drummond over to Westport."
"So I hev; but I'm to go for him early to-morrow-mornin.' 'Spect, ef he'd know you was a comin,' he'd staid here."
"Humph!" said Aunt Moll, dubiously.
"Did he seem lonely during my—during our absence?" asked Sibyl.