"Why don't you answer, Gilbert?" urged his wife. "What prevents you from going home?"
"I parted with my father in anger. I am doubtful, for he is an obstinate man, whether he will be willing to receive us."
"Don't put him to the trial," said Mrs. Rowly. "Let Sophy write, and tell him we are coming, and start without giving him time to send a refusal. We must go somewhere; to remain here is impossible, for you cannot draw your pension for the next six months, and we cannot live upon air."
Gilbert was terribly perplexed. While pride forbade him to seek an asylum with his parents, necessity compelled him to do so, and though he now almost loathed both his wife and her mother, he was too manly to leave them in distress.
He therefore sold his watch, his sword and regimental suit, to procure money to prosecute their journey; and when he arrived at Hadstone, he had only a few shillings left in his purse.
The kind reception he met with cut him to the heart, and the sight of that beautiful girl, who might have been his, almost maddened him with grief and remorse.
When he proposed that walk with his father, he fully intended to open his mind to him, and tell him how he was situated, but shame and pride kept him tongue tied. Besides, was it not his father's fault that he had not married the woman he loved; and could he expect an avaricious man to sympathize with him in the misery he endured, or feel for his present poverty and degradation. So he walked by his father's side over the old fields that had witnessed his labours with Dorothy, without saying a word upon the subject nearest his heart. It was with feelings of inward disgust that he saw his wife and her mother coming over the heath to meet them.