Mary dropped the letter into the money-drawer, for there was a customer in the shop waiting to be served—and then came in another. When the second was gone, she took it out and looked at it, turned it about, and examined it, and kissed it, and then put it away again. She felt that she dared not open it till night, when all her business was over, and her shop closed, and she might pour out her tears without interruption. She could scarcely tell whether she most longed or feared to open it; and when at length the quiet hour came, and her father was in bed, and her baby asleep in its cradle beside her, and she sat down to read it, she looked at it, and pressed it to her bosom, and kissed it again and again, before she broke the seal; and then when she had done so, the paper shook in her hand, and her eyes were obscured with tears, and the light seemed so dim that she could not at first decipher anything but "My darling Mary!" It was easy to read that, for he always called her his darling Mary—but what came next? "Joy! joy! dry your dear tears, for I know how fast they are falling, and be happy! I am not going abroad with the regiment, and I shall soon be a free man. Major D'Arcy has met with a sad accident, and cannot go to a foreign station; and as he wishes me not to leave him, he is going to purchase my discharge," &c. &c.
Many a night had Mary lain awake from grief, but this night she could not sleep for joy. It was such a surprise, such an unlooked-for piece of good fortune. It might indeed be some time before she could see her husband, but he was free, and sooner or later they should be together. Everybody who came to the shop the next day wondered what had come over Mrs. Walkingham. She was not like the same woman.
It was about eight months after the arrival of the above welcome intelligence, on a bright winter's morning, Mary as usual up betimes, her shop all in order, her child washed and dressed, and herself as neat and clean "as a new pin," as her neighbor, Mrs. Crump the laundress, used to say of her—her heart as usual full of Tracy, and more than commonly full of anxiety about him, for the usual period for his writing was some time passed. She was beginning to be uneasy at his prolonged silence, and to fear that he was ill.
"No letter for me, Mr. Ewart?" she said, as she stood on the step with her child in her arms, watching for the postman.
"None to-day, Mrs. Walkingham; better luck next time!" answered the functionary, as he trotted past. Mary, disappointed was turning in, resolving that night to write and upbraid her husband for causing her so much uneasiness, when she heard the horn that announced the approach of the London coach, and she stopped to see it pass; for there were pleasant memories connected with that coach: it was the occasion of her first acquaintance with Tracy—so had the driver sounded his horn, which she, absorbed in her troubles, had not heard; so had he cracked his whip; so had the wheels rattled over the stones; and so had the idle children in the street run hooting and hallooing after it; but not so had it dashed up to her door and stopped. It cannot be!—yes, it is—Tracy himself, in a drab great-coat and crape round his hat, jumping down from behind! The guard throws him a large portmanteau, and a paper parcel containing a new gown for Mary and a frock for the boy; and in a moment more they are in the little back parlor in each other's arms. Major D'Arcy was dead, and Tracy had returned to his wife to part no more—so we will shut the door, and leave them to their happiness, while we take a peep at Mr. Jonas Aldridge.
We left him writhing under the painful discovery that the rightful heir of the property he was enjoying, at least so far as his uncle's intentions were concerned, was not only in existence, but was actually the husband of Lane's daughter; and although he sometimes hoped the fatal paper had been destroyed, since he could in no other way account for its non-production, still the galling apprehension that it might some day find its way to light was ever a thorn in his pillow; and the natural consequence of this irritating annoyance was, that while he hated both Tracy and his wife, he kept a vigilant eye on their proceedings, and had a restless curiosity about all that concerned them. He would have been not only glad to eject them from the house they occupied, and even to drive them out of the town altogether, but he had a vague fear of openly meddling with them; so that the departure of the regiment, and its being subsequently ordered abroad, afforded him the highest satisfaction; in proportion to which was his vexation at Tracy's release, and ultimate return as a free man, all which particulars he extracted from Mr. Reynolds as regularly as the payment of the quarter's rent.
"And what does he mean to do now?" inquired Jonas.
"To settle here, I fancy," returned Mr. Reynolds. "They seem to be doing very well in the little shop; and I believe they have some thoughts of extending their business."
This was extremely unpleasant intelligence, and the more so, that it was not easy to discover any means of defeating these arrangements; for as Mr. Jonas justly observed, as he soliloquized on the subject, "In this cursed country there is no getting rid of such a fellow!"
In the town of which we speak there are along the shore several houses of public resort of a very low description, chiefly frequented by soldiers and sailors; and in war-times it was not at all an uncommon thing for the hosts of these dens to be secretly connected with the pressgangs and recruiting companies, both of whom, at a period when men were so much needed for the public service, pursued their object after a somewhat unscrupulous fashion. Among the most notorious of these houses was one called the Britannia, kept by a man of the name of Gurney, who was reported to have furnished, by fair means or foul, a good many recruits to his Majesty's army and navy. Now it occurred to Mr. Jonas Aldridge that Gurney might be useful to him in his present strait; nor did he find any unwillingness on the part of that worthy person to serve his purposes.