“Is it you, Margaret? How d’ye do?”
Some great rough man had come up, and was attempting to kiss her. Margaret started back with a cry. She would have closed the door against him; but he was the stronger and got in.
“Why, what possesses the child! Don’t you know me?”
Every pulse in Margaret Rymer’s body tingled to pain as she recognized him. It was her brother Benjamin. Better, than this, that it had been what she fancied—some rude stranger, who in another moment would have passed on and been gone for ever. Benjamin’s coming was always the signal for discomfort at home, and Margaret felt half-paralyzed with dismay.
“How are the old folk, Maggie?”
“Papa is very ill,” she answered, her voice slightly trembling. “My mother is well as usual. I think she was writing to you this afternoon.”
“Governor ill! So I’ve heard. Upstairs a good deal, is he not?”
“Quite half his time, I think.”
“Who attends here?”
“I do.”