"Very well, let us go in."
We had left Margaret at home. She was often absent from our study fire, not in peevishness, or gloom, for they were foreign to her nature; but still she bore evidence of her great renunciation.
As I have said, she was much alone, deeming it, I doubt not, due to her lover that she should share his solitude, even if separately borne. She sought to fill up that which was behind of the sufferings of the man she loved. This I make no doubt was her secret delight; for only a woman knows the process of that joy which is exhaled when sorrow and love flow mingled down.
Margaret had not been beside our study fire that winter night. But on our departure she came down from her half widowed room to sit beside it. It was the same hearth she had kindled in other days "in expectation of a guest." As she entered the room, her eye fell upon the note which I had left lying in my chair. A glance at it revealed to her Angus' name. It was soon perused and it needed to be read but once. Swift action followed, for there is no such thinker as the heart; and if women were on the Bench to-morrow, "Judgment reserved" would vanish from our judicial records.
Margaret's decision was taken before she laid the letter down, and a flush of eager joy glowed on her face. In a moment she was back in her room, quickly moving here and there, gathering this and that together, bending over a small travelling-bag that lay upon the bed. Her ruling thought was one of gladness, even joy—and the traveller's joy at that. Who does not know the sudden thrill of rapture when there comes to us a sudden summons to a long and unexpected journey?
And Margaret was starting on a long journey, how long, only God could tell. She thought of this as she glanced about the pretty room that had shared her secret thoughts since childhood, that had seen the awaking of her love, and had oftentimes kept with her the vigil of unsleeping joy. More than once the poor little room had feared it was soon to be outgrown, and left far behind; but still at night Margaret would return to its pure protection, and still it knew the fragrance of a virgin's trembling love.
She was almost through the door when she turned once again and bade it a long farewell, the same as a maiden on her bridal morn. For she too was on her way to an altar; and the vows for sickness or health, for life or death, seemed to be upon her now.
She had got as far as the garden gate when she stopped suddenly.
"I have forgotten the letter," she said to herself. Laying her travelling-bag upon the ground, she ran swiftly back, but the door had locked behind her, and her latch-key was in her room.
"What shall I do? What shall I do?" she cried to herself. "I cannot get in without the letter, and they will soon be back."