"She's been in a heavy sleep for most of the time since morning," replied Mrs. Wilkinson, turning her face aside, so that her husband could not see its changed expression.
Mr. Wilkinson's habitual use of brandy had long been a source of trouble to his wife. In reviewing the painful incidents of the previous evening, a hope had sprung up in her heart that the effect would be to awaken his mind to a sense of his danger, cause him to reflect, and lead to a change of habit. Alas! how like a fairy frost-work fabric melted this hope away, as the strong breath of her husband fell upon her face. She turned away and sighed—sighed in her spirit, but not audibly; for, even in her pain and disappointment, active love prompted to concealment, lest the shadow that came over her should repel the one she so earnestly sought to win from his path of danger.
Ah, who can tell the effort it cost that true-hearted wife to call up the smile with which, scarcely a moment afterwards, she looked into her husband's face!
"It is no worse, if no better," was her sustaining thought; and she leaned upon it, fragile reed as it was.
CHAPTER VII.
"COME home early, dear," said Mrs. Wilkinson, resting her hand upon her husband, and looking into his face with a loving smile. "The time seems so long when you are away!"
"Does it?" returned Wilkinson, and he kissed his wife. Yet, did not the tenderness of tone with which he spoke, nor the act of love which accompanied it, hide from the quick perception of Mary the fact that her husband's thoughts were elsewhere.
"Oh, yes," she replied. "I count the hours when you are absent. You'll be home early to tea?"
"Certainly I will. There now, let your heart be at rest."