'"I think so too," she answered, as quietly as possible, "and I have no right to burden Duncan. I am sure he will listen to reason when I tell him Phoebe is against our marrying." And she never said another word about it. But Duncan came to me about six months afterwards and asked me to put up his banns.
'"I wanted Susan Locke," he said, in a shamefaced manner, "but that sister of hers hinders our marrying; so, as I must think of the children, I have got Janet Sharpe to promise me. She is a good, steady lass, and Susan speaks well of her."'
Uncle Max had told his story without interruption. I listened to it with almost painful interest.
With what quiet self-denial this homely woman had put aside her own hopes of happiness for the sake of the sickly creature dependent on her! She had owned her affection for Duncan with the utmost simplicity; but in her unselfishness she refused to burden him with her responsibilities. If she married him she must do her duty by him and his children, and she felt that Phoebe would be a drag on her strength and time.
'She is a good woman, Uncle Max,' I observed, when he had finished. 'She is working herself to death, and Phoebe never gives her a word of comfort.'
'How can you expect it?' he replied quietly. 'You cannot draw comfort out of empty wells, and poor Phoebe's heart is like a broken cistern, holding nothing.'
'But surely you talk to her, Uncle Max?'
'I have tried to do so,' he answered sadly; 'but for the last year she has refused to see me, and Hamilton has advised me to keep away. If I cross the threshold it is to see Miss Locke. I thought it was a whim at first, and I sent Tudor in my stead; but she was so rude to him, and lashed herself into such a fury against us clerics, that he came back looking quite scared, and asked why I had sent him to a mad woman.'
'She was angry with me to-day.' And I told him about the blind.
'That is right, Ursula,' he said encouragingly. 'You have made a good beginning: the singing may do more to soften her strange nature than all our preaching. You will be a comfort to Miss Locke, at any rate.' And then he stopped, and looked at me rather wistfully, as though he longed to tell me something but could not make up his mind to do it 'You will be a comfort to us all if you go on in this way,' he continued; and then he surprised me by asking if I had not yet seen the ladies from Gladwyn.