"Going away!" repeated Queenie in a low voice, and then she sat down. She felt all at once so strangely tired.
"Yes; I heard him tell Langley that he must take the seven o'clock train, so he has gone long ago now. Some uncle of theirs is ill, I think they said he lived at Perth; but anyhow he sent for Mr. Garth in a great hurry."
"And what was his message, Emmie?" putting up her hand to her head, as though conscious of some numb pain.
"Well, he told me to say how sorry he was to miss you and not to say good-bye, and that you were not to lose heart about things; and oh—yes, he told me that twice over, that he hoped if you were in any trouble or perplexity that you would write to him or Langley, for they would do anything to help you. And he kissed me half-a-dozen times I am sure!" with a triumphant air; "and then Langley said they must go, and he got up very slowly and went away."
"Oh, it is too hard! it is more than I can bear!" broke from Queenie's pale lips when she was alone with her thoughts that night. "To leave for months, for ever, perhaps, and never to wish him good-bye, not even a word or look to treasure up in my memory." And for a long time she wept bitterly.
But by-and-bye she became more reasonable. "It is wrong of me, I ought not to wish to see him if he belongs to Dora. Perhaps it is better so, after all." But, nevertheless, the bitterness of that disappointment abided with her for many a long day.
When Langley wrote to her brother she spoke very briefly of the leave-taking. "Ted and I saw them off, and Mr. Logan was with us. Emmie clung to us and cried a good deal, but Miss Marriott was very quiet, and scarcely spoke. She begged me to thank you for your message, and regretted that she had not seen you, that was all."
Garth sighed over this brief message, but he understood Queenie's reticence perfectly. "So they are gone, and the happy Brierwood Cottage days are over," he said to himself, as he sat in the dim, sick room, revolving many things in his mind.
Queenie had a dreary journey. Emmie was so exhausted with excitement and emotion that she slept the greater part of the way, and left her sister in perfect freedom to indulge in all manner of sad thoughts.
Queenie never recalled that day without a shudder. A sadness, indescribable but profound, weighed down her spirits—a feeling of intolerable desolation and loneliness as hour after hour passed on, and the distance lengthened between her and the friends whom she had grown to love.