Then, after a pause, during which he chafed his hands over the dancing flame, he added: "I wish you were back in the old Ship. The old Ship! It is no longer the dear old Ship of my recollections, now that you have deserted. Why did you leave? It is strange to me that my mother did not write and tell me that you were going to be married. If she had done that—"
He continued drying his hands, looking dreamily into the flame, and left the sentence incomplete.
"It is queer altogether," he pursued. "When I told her I was at Guildford, and proposed returning, she put me off, till my father was better prepared. She would break the news to him, see how—he took it, and so on. I waited, heard no more, so came unsummoned, for I was impatient at the delay. She knew I wished to hear about you, Mattee, dear old friend and playmate. I asked in my letters about you. You know you ceased to write, and mother labored at the pen herself, finally. She answered that you were well—nothing further. Why did she not tell me of your engagement? Have you any idea, Matabel?"
She bowed over the turf, to hide her fate, but the leaping flame revealed the color that mantled cheek, and throat, and brow. Her heart was beating furiously.
"That marriage seems to me to have been cobbled up precious quickly. Were you so mighty impatient to have the Broom-Squire that you could not wait till you were twenty? A girl of eighteen does not know her own mind. A pretty kettle of fish there will be if you discover, when too late, that you have made a mistake, and married the wrong man, who can never make you happy."
Mehetabel started upright, and went with heaving bosom to the window, then drew back in surprise, for she saw the face of Mrs. Rocliffe at the pane, her nose applied to and flattened against the glass, and looking like a dab of putty.
She was offended at the woman's inquisitiveness, and went to the door to inquire if she needed anything.
"Nuthin' at all," answered Sarah, with a laugh, "except to see whether my brother was home. It's early days beginning this, I call it."
"What do you mean?"
"Oh, nuthin'."