‘You see, ma’am, the baker, his cart was at the door,—and he ups and says, if the young lady had no objection, he’d take it and welcome. So I gives him a hand up with it, and never see the address—except just London.’
‘You are sure it was London?’
‘Oh yes, Colonel—at least, I wouldn’t like to take nothing in the nature of an oath: but so far as being sure——’
‘That will do,’ said Mrs. Hayward quickly. ‘Now, you may go.’ She burst forth as soon as the door was closed, ‘She has done what her mother did; but why—but why?’
A little later, before this mournful company separated, Joyce’s little writing-case was brought downstairs, and in it was found Andrew’s letter and Mrs. Bellendean’s folded together. On a piece of paper separate—which, however, had no appearance of being intended for a letter—Joyce had written something in a large straggling hand, very different from her usual neat writing. It was this——
‘I can do no other thing. To him I would be mansworn—and to her no true friend. And what I said was, Joyce will do—what is wanted of her. I can do no other thing.’
CHAPTER XLVII
Nearly twenty-four hours later the chill of the wintry night had closed over the village of Bellendean. The frosty weather had gone, and was replaced by the clammy dampness and heavily charged atmosphere of a thaw. There had been showers during the day, and a Scotch mist had set in with the falling of the night. Janet Matheson and her old husband were sitting on either side of the fire. Peter had got to feel the severity of the winter weather, and though he still did his day’s work, he was heavy and tired, and sat stretching his long limbs across the hearth with that desire for more rest which shows the flagging of the strength and spirit. Janet on the other side of the fire was knitting the usual dark-grey stocking with yards of leg, which it was astonishing to think could be always wanted by one man. They were talking little. An observation once in half an hour or so, a little stir of response, and then the silence would fall over them again, unbroken by anything but the fall of the ashes from the grate, or the ticking of the clock. Sometimes Janet would carry on a little monologue for a few minutes, to which Peter gave here and there a deep growl of reply; but there was little that could be called conversation between the old pair, who knew all each other’s thoughts, and were ‘company’ to each other without a word said. There were few sounds even outside: now and then a heavy foot going by: now and then a boy running in his heavy shoes on some cold errand. The cold and the rain had sent indoors all the usual stragglers of the night.
‘Yon letter’s near a week auld,’ said Peter. They had not been talking of Joyce; but a quarter of an hour before had briefly, with a few straggling remarks at long intervals, discussed the crop which ‘the maister’ had settled upon for the Long Park, a selection of which Peter did not approve; but no explanation was needed for this introduction of a new subject. There could be no doubt between them as to what ‘yon letter’ meant.
‘There’ll be anither the morn,’ said Janet, ‘when she has passed the Thursday, it aye comes on the Saturday. She will have been thrang with something or other. It’s the time coming on for a’ thae pairties and balls.’