“Not painfully,” said Margaret, with a faltering voice and unsteady smile; “gladly, if I could put faith in it. Jeanie had a brother that was lost at sea, or we thought he was lost. It was his loss that made her so—ill; and she took you for him—you are like him, Mr. Earnshaw. Well,” said Margaret, two tears dropping out of her eyes, “they have had a letter—he is not dead, he is perhaps coming home.”
“What has become of him, then?—and why did he never send word?” cried Edgar. “How heartless, how cruel!”
Margaret laid her hand softly on his arm.
“Ah! you must not say that!” she cried. “Sailors do not think so much of staying away a year or two. He was shipwrecked, and lost everything, and he could not come home in his poverty upon granny. Oh! if we were all as thoughtful as that! Mr. Earnshaw, sailors are not just to be judged like other men.”
“He might have killed his poor little sister!” cried Edgar, indignantly; “that is a kind of conduct for which I have no sympathy. And granny, as you call her——”
“Ah! you never learnt to call her granny,” said Margaret, with animation. “Dear granny has never been strong since her last attack—the shock, though it was joy, was hard upon her. And she was afraid for Jeanie; but Jeanie has stood it better than anybody could hope; and perhaps he is there now,” said Margaret, with once more the tears falling suddenly from her eyes.
“You know him?” said Edgar.
“Oh! know him! I knew him like my own heart!” cried Margaret, a flush of sudden colour spreading over her pale face. She did not look up, but kept her eyes upon the ground, going softly along by Edgar’s side, her beautiful face full of emotion. “He would not write till he had gained back again what was lost. He is coming home captain of his ship,” she said, with an indescribable soft triumph.
At that moment a weight was lifted off Edgar’s mind—it was as when the clouds suddenly break, and the sun bursts forth. He too could have broken forth into songs or shoutings, to express his sense of release. “I am glad that everything is ending so happily,” he said, in a subdued tone. He did not trust himself to look at her, any more than Margaret could trust herself to look at him. When they reached the cottage, she went in, and got her letter, and put it into his hand to read; while she herself played with Sibby, throwing her ball for her, entering into the child’s glee with all the lightness of a joyful heart. Edgar could not but look at her, between the lines of Jeanie’s simple letter. He seemed to himself so well able to read the story, and to understand what Margaret’s soft blush and subdued excitement of happiness meant.
And yet Harry Thornleigh was still undismissed, and hoped to win her. He met him as he himself returned to the house. Harry was still uncivil, and had barely acknowledged Edgar’s presence at breakfast; but he stopped him now, almost with a threatening look.