Amy, saying something about looking to the state of the spare room, left them in the parlour. Truth to say, the hint had scared her. Down deep in her mind, for some short while past, had a suspicion lain that they were rather more attached to each other than need be. She had only hoped it was not so. She did not by any means see her way clear to hinder it, and was content to let the half fear rest; but these words had roused it in all its force. They had somehow brought a conviction of the fact, and she saw trouble looming. What else could come of it? Anna was no match for Isaac Thornycroft.
"Sam," began Mrs. Copp, when she was alone with her son, "how does Amy continue to go on? Makes a good wife still?"
Captain Copp nodded complacently. "Never a better wife going. No tantrums--no blowings off: knits all my stockings and woollen jerseys."
"You must have a quiet house."
"Should, if 'twere not for Sarah. She fires off for herself and Amy too. I'm obliged to keep her under."
"Ah," said Mrs. Copp, rubbing her chin. "Then I expect you get up some breezes together. But she's not a bad servant, Sam."
"She's a clipper, mother--A 1; couldn't steer along without her."
What with the boxes, and what with the exactions of the spare bed-room to render it habitable for the night, for Mrs. Copp generally chose to put herself into everybody's business, and especially into her own, the two ladies had to leave Captain Copp very much to his own society. Solitude is the time for reflection, we are told, and it may have been the cause of the captain's recurring again and again to the hint his mother had dropped in regard to Isaac Thornycroft. That there was nothing in it yet he fully assumed, and it might be as well to take precautions that nothing should be in it for the future. Prevention was better than cure. Being a straightforward man, one who could not have gone in a roundabout or cautious way to work, it occurred to the captain to say a word to Mr. Isaac on the very first opportunity.
It was the first evening Anna had spent at the Red Court since Miss Thornycroft left it. The walk there, the sojourn, the walk home again by moonlight, all seemed to partake of heaven's own happiness--perfect, pure, peaceful. There had been plenty and plenty of opportunities for lingering together in the twilight on the heath in coming home from the seashore, but this was the first long legitimate walk they had taken; and considering that they were sixty minutes over it, when they might have done it in sixteen, it cannot be said they hurried themselves.
The captain was at the window, not looking on the broad expanse of heath before him, but at the faint light seen now and again from some fishing vessel cruising in the distance. It was his favourite look-out; and, except on a boisterous or rainy night, the shutters were rarely closed until ten o'clock.