"Bessy has fallen down, Mrs. Gleeson. Her knees are bleeding."
"And how could you think of lugging her all up the cliff, Miss Jane! I declare you be as white as a sheet. A fat, heavy child like her! Fell down on your knees, have you, you tiresome little grub. There's one or another on you always a-doing of it."
"It is a warm morning, and I have been walking to and from Stilborough," remarked Jane, as she rose to go on, and not choosing to be told she looked white without accounting for it. "Wash her knees with some hot water please, Mrs. Gleeson: I dare say she is in pain, poor little thing."
"Lawk a me, Miss Jane," the woman called after her, "if you had half-a-dozen of 'em about you always you'd know better nor to take notice o' such trifles as knees." But Jane was already nearly out of hearing.
Harry was not the only one of the Castlemaine family who went that day to Stilborough. In the full brightness of the afternoon, the close carriage of the Master of Greylands, attended by its liveried servants, might have been seen bowling on its way thither, and one lady, attired in the dress of the Grey Sisters, seated inside it. A lady who was grand, and noble, and beautiful, in spite of the simple attire--Mary Ursula.
She was about to pay a visit to that friend of hers on whom misfortune had fallen--Mrs. Ord. The double calamity--loss of husband and loss of fortune--reaching Mrs. Ord by the same mail, had thrown her upon a sick-bed; and she was at all times delicate. The letter that Mary had sat up to write was despatched by a messenger early in the morning: and she had craved the loan of her uncle's close carriage to convey her on a personal visit. The close carriage: Mary shrunk (perhaps from the novelty of it) from showing herself this first time in her changed dress among her native townspeople.
The carriage left her at Mrs. Ord's house, and was directed to return for her in an hour; and Mary was shown up to the sick-chamber. It was a sad interview: this poor Mrs. Ord--whose woes, however, need not be entered upon here in detail, as she has nothing to do with the story--was but a year or two older than Mary Ursula. They had been girls together. She was very ill now: and Mary felt that at this early stage little or no consolation could be offered. She herself had had her sorrows since they last met, and it was a trying hour to both of them. Before the hour had expired, Mary took her leave and went do wn to the drawing-room to wait for the carriage.
She had closed the door, and was halfway across the richly-carpeted floor, before she became aware that any one was in the room. It was a gentleman--who rose from the depths of a lounging-chair at her approach. Every drop of blood in Mary's veins seemed to stand still, and then rush wildly on: her sight momentarily failed her, her senses were confused: and but that she had shut the door behind her, and come so far, she might have retreated again. For it was William Blake-Gordon.
They stood facing each other for an instant in silence, both painfully agitated. Mary's grey bonnet was in her hand; she had taken it off in the sick-chamber; he held an open letter, that he had been apparently reading to pass away the time, while the servants should carry his message to their sick mistress and bring back an answer. Mary saw the writing of the letter and recognized it for Agatha Mountsorrel's. In his confusion, as he hastily attempted to refold the letter, it escaped his hand, and fluttered to the ground. The other hand he was holding out to her.
She met it, scarcely perhaps conscious of what she did. He felt the trembling of the fingers he saw the agitation of the wan white face. Not a word did either of them speak. Mary sat down on a sofa, he took a chair near, after picking up his letter.