"Oh! conscience o' man!" exclaimed Willie, "what sort o' a dream is this? It canna be possible! Her dead, and him, oot o' his judgment, mourning owre her grave in the garb o' a beggar!"
"Ha! discovered again!" cried Henry fiercely, and starting round as he spoke; but immediately recognising the old domestic, on whom time had not wrought such a metamorphosis as dress had upon Willie Galloway—"Ha, Jonathan! old Jonathan Holditch!" he added, "do I again see the face of a friend!" and instantly discovering Willie, he sprang forward and grasped his extended hand in both of his.
The old man sat down upon the grave and wept.
"Don't weep, Jonathan," said Henry, "I trust that we shall soon have cause to rejoice."
"I wish a' may be richt yet," thought Willie; "I took him to be rather dementit at the first glance, and rejoice is rather a strange word to use owre a young wife's grave. Puir fellow!"
"Yes, Master Henry," said Jonathan, "I do rejoice that the worst is past; but I must weep too, for there be many things in all this that I do not understand."
"Nor me either," said Willie; "but ye say ye think more than ye dare tell."
"Why is it, Jonathan," continued Henry, "that there is no stone to mark my mother's grave? There is room enough in our burial place. Why is there nothing to her memory?" he continued, bending his eyes upon her sepulchre. "Her memory!" he added; "cold, cruel grave; and is memory all that is left me of such a parent? Is the dumb dust, beneath this unlettered stone—all!—all! that I can now call mother? Has she no monument but the tears of her only surviving child?"
"A' about his mother," muttered Willie, "who has been dead for four years, and no a word aboot puir Helen! As sure as I'm a living man this is beyont my comprehension—I dinna think he can be a'thegither there!"
Henry turned towards him and said, "I have much to ask, my dear friend, but my heart is so filled with griefs and forebodings already, that the words I would utter tremble on my tongue; but what of my Helen—tell me, what of her?"