Wilful Disobedience.
Mary Ann Thornycroft sat in the large, luxurious, comfortable
drawing-room of the Red Court Farm. The skies without were grey and
wintry, the air was cold, the sea was of a dull leaden colour; but
with that cheery fire blazing in the grate, the soft chairs and sofas
scattered about, the fine pictures, the costly ornaments, things were
decidedly bright within. Brighter a great deal than the young lady's
face was; for something had just occurred to vex her. She was leaning
back in her chair; her foot, peeping out from beneath the folds of her
flowing dress, impatiently tapping the carpet: angry determination
written on every line of her countenance. Between herself and Richard
there had just occurred a passage at arms--as is apt to be the case
with brother and sister, when each has a dominant and unyielding will.
At home for good, Miss Thornycroft had assumed her post as mistress
of the house in a spirit of determination that said she meant to
maintain it. The neighbours came flocking to see the handsome girl, a
woman grown now. She had attained her nineteenth year. They found a
lady-like, agreeable girl, with Cyril's love for reading, Isaac's fair
skin and beautiful features, and Richard's resolute tone and lip. Very
soon, within a week of her return, the servants whispered to each
other that Miss Thornycroft and her brothers had already begun their
quarrelling, for both sides wanted the mastery. They should have said
her brother--very seldom indeed was it that Isaac interfered with
her--Cyril never.
She had begun by attempting to set to rights matters that probably
never would be set right; regularity in regard to the serving of the
meals. They set all regularity at defiance, especially on the point of
coming in to them. They might come, or they might not; they might sit
down at the appointed hour, or they might appear an hour after it.
Sometimes the dinners were simple, oftener elaborate; to-day they
would be alone, to-morrow six or eight unexpected guests, invited on
the spur of the moment, would sit down to table; just as it had been
in the old days. Mr. Thornycroft's love of free-and-easy hospitality
had not changed. To remedy _this_, Mary Anne did not attempt--it had
grown into a usage; but she did wish to make Richard and Isaac pay
more attention to decorum.
"They cannot be well-conducted, these two brothers of mine,"
soliloquized Miss Thornycroft, as she continued to tap her impatient
foot. "And papa winks at it. I think they must have acquired a love
for low companions. I hear of their going into the public-house, and,
if not drinking themselves, standing treat for others. Last night they
came in to dinner in their velveteen coats, and gaiters all mud--after
keeping it waiting for five-and-forty minutes. I spoke about their
clothes, and papa--papa took their part, saying it was not to be
expected that young men engaged in agriculture could dress themselves
up for dinner like a lord-in-waiting. It's a shame!"
Richard and Isaac did indeed appear to be rather loose young men in
some things; but their conduct had not changed from what it used to
be--the change lay in Miss Thornycroft. What as a girl she had not
seen or noticed, she now, a young woman come home to exact propriety
after the manner of well-conducted young ladies, saw at once, and put
a black mark against. Their dog-cart, that ever-favourite vehicle,
would be heard going out and coming in at all sorts of unseasonable
hours; when Richard and Isaac lay abed till twelve (the case
occasionally) Miss Thornycroft would contrive to gather that they had
not gone to it until nearly daylight.
The grievance this morning, however, was not about any of these
things: it concerned a more personal matter of Miss Thornycroft's.
While she was reading a letter from Susan Hunter, fixing the day of
the promised visit, Richard came in. He accused her of expecting
visitors, and flatly ordered her to write and stop their coming. A few
minutes of angry contention ensued, neither side giving way in the
smallest degree: she said her friends should come, Richard said they
should not. He strode away to find his father. The justice was in the
four-acre paddock with his gun.
"This girl's turning the house upside down," began Richard. "We shall
not be able to keep her at home."
"What girl? Do you mean Mary Anne?"
"There's nobody else I should mean," returned the young man, who was
not more remarkable for courtesy of speech, even to his father, than
he used to be. "I'd pretty soon shell out anybody else who came
interfering. She has gone and invited some fellow and his sister down
to stay for a week, she says. We can't have prying people here just
now."
"Don't fly in a flurry, Dick. That's the worst of you."
"Well, sir, I think it should be stopped. For the next month, you
know--"
"Yes, yes, I know," interposed the justice. "Of course."
"After that, it would not so much matter," continued Richard. "Not but
that it would be an exceedingly bad precedent to allow it at all. If
she begins to invite visitors here at will, there's no knowing what
the upshot might be."
"I'll go and speak to her," said Mr. Thornycroft. "Here, take the gun,
Dick."
Walking slowly, giving an eye to different matters as he passed,
speaking a word here, giving an order there, the justice went on after
the fashion of a man whose mind is at ease. It never occurred to him
that his daughter would dispute his will.
"What is all this, Mary Anne?" he demanded, when he reached her.
"Richard tells me you have been inviting some people to stay here."
Miss Thornycroft rose respectfully.
"So I have, papa. Susan Hunter was my great friend at school; she is
remaining there for the holidays, which of course is very dull, and I
asked her to come here for a week. Her brother will bring her."
"They cannot come," said Mr. Thornycroft.
"Not come!"
"No. You must understand one thing, Mary Anne--that you are _not at
liberty_ to invite people indiscriminately to the Red Court I cannot
sanction it."
A hard look of resentment crossed her face; opposition never answered
with the Thornycrofts, Cyril excepted: he was just as yielding as the
rest were obstinate.
"I have invited them, papa. The time for the visit is fixed, the
arrangements are made."
"I tell you, they cannot come."
"Not if Richard's whims are to be studied," returned Miss Thornycroft,
angrily, for she had lost her temper. "Do you wish me to live on in
this house for ever, papa, without a soul to speak to, save my
brothers and the servants? And cordial companions _they_ are," added
the young lady, alluding to the former, "out, out, out, as they are,
night after night! I should like to know where it is they go to.
Perhaps I could find out if I tried."
A fanciful person might have thought that Mr. Thornycroft started.
"Daughter!" he cried, in a hoarse whisper, hoarse with passion, "hold
your peace about your brothers. What is it to you where they go or
what they do? Is it seemly for you, a girl, to trouble yourself about
the doings of young men? Are you going to turn out a firebrand amongst
us? Take care that you don't set the Red Court alight."
The words might have struck her as strange, might indeed have imparted
a sort of undefined fear, but that she was so filled with anger and
resentment as to leave no room for other impressions. Nevertheless,
there was that in her father's face and eye which warned her it would
not do to oppose him now, and her rejoinder was spoken more civilly.
"Do you mean, papa, that you will never allow me to have a visitor?"
"I do not say that. But I must choose the times and seasons. This
companion of yours may come a month later, if you wish it so very
much. Not her brother. We have enough young men in the house of our
own. And I suppose you don't care for him."
Miss Thornycroft would have liked to say that he was the one for whom
she did care--not the sister--but that was inexpedient. A conscious
flush dyed her face; which Mr. Thornycroft attributed to pain at her
wish being opposed. He had not yet to learn how difficult it was to
turn his daughter from any whim on which she had set her will.
"Write to-day and stop their coming. Tell Miss--what's the name?"
"Hunter," was the sullen answer.
"Tell Miss Hunter that it is not convenient to receive her at the time
arranged, but that you hope to see her later. And--another word, Mary
Anne," added Mr. Thornycroft, pausing in the act of leaving the room;
"a word of caution; _let your brothers alone_; their movements are no
business of yours, neither must you make it such. Shut your eyes and
ears to all that does not concern you, if you want to live in peace
under my roof."
"Shut my eyes and ears?" she repeated, looking after him, "that I
never will. I can see how it is--papa has lived so long under the
domineering of Richard that he yields to him as a habit. It is less
trouble than opposing him. Richard is the most selfish man alive. He
thinks if we had visitors staying at the court, he must be a little
more civilized in dress and other matters, and he does not choose to
be so. For no other reason has he set his face against their coming;
there can be no other. But I will show him that I have a will as well
as he, and as good a right to exercise it."
Even as Miss Thornycroft spoke, the assertion, "there can be no
other," rose up again in her mind, and she paused to consider whether
it was strictly in accordance with facts. But no; look on all sides as
she would, there appeared to be no other reason whatever, or shadow of
reason. It was just a whim of Richard's; who liked to act, in small
things as in great, as though he were the master of the Red Court
Farm--a whim which Miss Thornycroft was determined not to gratify.
And, flying in the face of the direct command of her father, she did
not write to stop her guests.
The contest had not soothed her, and she put on her things to go out.
The day was by no means inviting, the air was raw and chill, but Miss
Thornycroft felt dissatisfied with home. Turning off by the plateau
towards the village, the house inhabited by Tomlett met her view. It
brought to her remembrance that the man was said to have received some
slight accident, of which she had only heard a day or two ago. More as
a diversion to her purposeless steps than anything else, she struck
across to inquire after him. Mrs. Tomlett, an industrious little woman
with a red face and shrill voice, as you may remember, stood at the
kitchen table as Miss Thornycroft approached the open door, peeling
potatoes. Down went the knife.
"Don't disturb yourself, Mrs. Tomlett. I hear your husband has met
with some hurt. How was it done?"
For a woman of ordinary nerve and brain, Mrs. Tomlett decidedly showed
herself wanting in self-possession at the question. It seemed to scare
her. Looking here, looking there, looking everywhere like a frightened
bird, she mumbled out some indistinct answer. Miss Thornycroft had
seen her so on occasions before, and as a girl used to laugh at her.
"When did it happen, Mrs. Tomlett?"
"Last week, miss; that is, last month--last fortnight I meant to say,"
cried Mrs. Tomlett, hopelessly perplexed.
"What _was_ the accident?" continued Miss Thornycroft. "Well, it was
a--a--a pitching of himself down the stairs, miss."
"Down which stairs? This house has no stairs."
Mrs. Tomlett looked to the different points of the room as if to
assist her remembrance that the house had none.
"No, miss, true; it wasn't stairs. He got hurted _some_ way," added
the woman, in a pang of desperation. "I never knowed clear how. When
they brought him home--a carrying of him--his head up, as one might
say, and his legs down, my senses was clean frightened out o' me: what
they said and what they didn't say, I couldn't remember after no more
nor nothing. May be 'twas out o' the tallet o' the Red Court stables
he fell, miss: I think it was."
Miss Thornycroft thought not; she should have heard of that. "Where
was he hurt?" she asked. "In the leg, was it not?"
"'Twas in the arm, miss," responded Mrs. Tomlett. "Leastways, in the
ankle."
The young lady stared at her as a natural curiosity. "Was it in both,
Mrs. Tomlett?"
Well, yes, Mrs. Tomlett thought it might be in both. His side also had
got grazed. Her full opinion was, if she might venture to express it,
that he had done it a climbing up into his boat. One blessed thing
was--no bones was broke.
Miss Thornycroft laughed, and thought she might as well leave her to
the peeling of the potatoes, the interruption to which essential duty
had possibly driven her senses away.
"At any rate, whatever the hurt, I hope he will soon be about again,"
she kindly said, as she went out.
"Which he is a'most that a'ready," responded Mrs. Tomlett, standing on
the threshold to curtsey to her guest.
No sooner was the door shut than Tomlett, a short, strong, dark man,
with a seal-skin cap on, and his right arm bandaged up, came limping
out of an inner room. The first thing he did was to glare at his wife;
the second, to bring his left hand in loud contact with the small
round table so effectually that the potatoes went flying off it.
"Now what do _you_ think of yourself for a decent woman?"
Mrs. Tomlett sat down on a chair and began to cry. "It took to me,
Ben, it did--it took to me awful," she said, deprecatingly, in the
midst of her tears; "I never knowed as news of the hurt had got
abroad."
"Do you suppose there ever was such a born fool afore as _you?_" again
demanded Mr. Tomlett, in a slow, subdued, ironical, fearfully telling
tone.
"When she come straight in with the query--what was Tomlett's hurt and
how were it done?--my poor body set on a twittering, and my head went
clean out o' me," pleaded Mrs. Tomlett.
"A pity but it had gone clean _off_ ye," growled the strong-minded
husband; "'tain't o' no good _on_."
"What were I to say, took at a pinch like that? I couldn't tell the
truth; you know that, Tomlett."
"Yes, you could; you might ha' told enough on't to satisfy her:--'He
was at work, and he fell and hurt hisself.' Warn't that enough for any
reasonable woman to say? And if she'd asked where he fell, you might
ha' said you didn't know. Not you! He 'throwed hisself down the
stairs,' when there ain't no stairs to the place; he 'fell out o' the
tallet;' he 'done it a climbing up into his boat!' Yah!"
"Don't be hard upon me, Tomlett, don't."
"'And the hurt,' she asked, 'was that in the leg?'" mercilessly
continued Mr. Tomlett. "'No, it weren't in the leg, it were in the
arm, leastways, in the ankle,' says you; and a fine bobbin o'
contradiction that must ha' sounded to her. Yah again! Some women be
born fools, and some makes theirselves into 'em."
"It were through knowing you'd get a listening, Tomlett. Nothing never
scares the wits out o' me like that. When I see the door open a
straw's breadth, I knew your ear was at it; and what with her afore me
talking, and you ahind me listening, I didn't know the words I said no
more nor if it wasn't me that spoke 'em. Do what I will, I'm blowed
up."
"Blowed up!" amiably repeated Mr. Tomlett; "if you was the wife o'
some persons, you'd get the blowing up and something atop of it. Go on
with them taturs."
Leaving them to their domestic bliss and occupations--though from the
above interlude Tomlett must not be judged: he made in general a good
husband, only he had been so terribly put out--we will go after Miss
Thornycroft. As she struck into the road again she saw Anna Chester
talking to one of her two elder brothers, it was too far off to
distinguish which; and indeed Richard and Isaac were so much alike in
figure, that the one was often taken for the other. That it was the
latter, Miss Thornycroft judged; there appeared to be a sort of
intimacy--a friendship--between Isaac and Anna that she by no means
approved of, and Isaac had taken to go rather often to Captain Copp's.
Anna came on alone; her gentle face beaming, her pretty lips breaking
into smiles. But Miss Thornycroft was cold.
"Which of my brothers were you talking to?"
"It was Isaac," answered Anna, turning her face away, for the trick of
colouring crimson at Isaac's name, acquired since her return, was all
too visible.
"Ah, yes, I knew it must be Isaac. What good friends you seem to be
growing!"
"Do you think so?" returned Anna, stooping to do something or other to
her dainty little boot, and speaking as lightly as the circumstances
permitted. "He stopped me to say that Captain Copp was going to dine
at the Red Court this evening, and so asked if I would accompany him."
"Oh, it's to be one of their dinner gatherings this evening, is it?"
replied Mary Anne, alluding to her brothers with her usual scant
ceremony. "Well, I hope you will come, Anna; otherwise I shall not go
in."
"Thank you. Yes."
"But look here. If you get telling Isaac things again that I tell you,
you and I shall quarrel. What is he to you that you should do it?"
Not for a long while had Anna felt so miserably bewildered. She began
ransacking her memory for all she had said. At these critical moments,
discovery seemed very near.
"This morning, Richard chose to question me about Susan Hunter's
coming down. He had heard of it from Isaac. Now I had not mentioned it
to Isaac, or to any one else at home: time enough for that when the
day was fixed; and Isaac could only have learnt it from you."
"I--I am not sure--I can't quite tell--it is possible I did mention it
to him," stammered poor Anna. "I did not think to do harm."
"I dare say not. But it _has_ done harm; it has caused no end of
mischief and disturbance at home, and got me into what my brothers
politely call a 'row.' Kindly keep my affairs to yourself for the
future, Anna."
She turned away with the last words, and the poor young wife, in a sea
of perplexity and distress, continued her way. The life she was
leading was exceedingly unsatisfactory; never a moment, save in some
chance and transitory meeting in the village or on the heath, did she
obtain one private word with Isaac. Isaac was rather a frequent
dropper-in now at Captain Copp's; but the cautious sailor, remembering
the warning hint of his mother, took care to afford no scope for
private talking; or, as he phrased it, sweethearting; and Mrs.
Copp--her terror of discovery being always fresh upon her guarded Anna
zealously. Could she have had her way, they would have passed each
other with a formal nod whenever they met.
"Never again," murmured Anna. "I must never again speak to him
about his home--unless it be of what the whole world knows. How
I wish this dreadful state of things could terminate! I have heard
of secrets--concealments--wearing the life away; I believe it now."
The former resident superintendent of the coastguard, Mr. Dangerfield,
had left Coastdown, and been replaced by Mr. Kyne. Private opinion ran
that Coastdown had not changed for the best; Mr. Supervisor
Dangerfield (the official title awarded him by Coastdown) having been
an easy, good-tempered, jolly kind of man, while Mr. Supervisor Kyne
was turning out to be strict and fussy on the score of "duty." Justice
Thornycroft, the great man of the place, had received him well, and
the new officer evidently liked the good cheer he was made welcome to
at the Red Court Farm.
On this same morning Mr. Thornycroft, strolling out from his home, saw
the supervisor on the plateau, and crossed the rails to join him. Mr.
Kyne, a spare man of middle age, with a greyish sort of face and hair
cut close to his head, stood on the extreme edge of the plateau,
attentively scanning the sea. He slowly turned as Mr. Thornycroft
approached.
"Looking out for smugglers?" demanded the justice, jestingly. For this
new superintendent had started the subject of smuggling soon after he
came to Coastdown, avowing a suspicion that it was carried on; the
justice had received it with a fit of laughter, and lost no
opportunity since of throwing ridicule on it.
"Shall I tell him, or not?" mentally debated Mr. Kyne. "Better not,
perhaps, until we can get hold of something more positive. He would
never believe it; he would resent it as a libel on Coastdown."
The fact was, Mr. Kyne had received information some short while
before, from what he considered a reliable source, that smuggling to a
great extent _was_ carried on at Coastdown, or on some part of the
coast lying nearly contiguous to it. He was redoubling his own
watchfulness and his preventive precautions: to find out such a thing
would be a great feather in his cap.
"You won't ridicule me out of my conviction, sir."
"Not I," said the justice; "I don't want to."
"I shall put a man on this plateau at night."
Mr. Thornycroft opened his eyes. "What on earth for?"
"Well--I suspect that place below."
"Suspect that place below!" repeated the justice, advancing to the
edge and looking down. "What is there on it to suspect?"
"Nothing--that's the truth. But if contraband things are landed,
that's the most likely spot about. There is no other at all that I see
where it _could_ be done."
"And so you look at it on the negative principle," cried the justice,
curling his lip. "Don't be afraid, Kyne. If the Half-moon had but a
bale of smuggled goods on it, there it must be until you seized it. Is
there a corner to hide it in, or facility for carrying it away?"
"That's what I say to myself," rejoined Mr. Kyne. "It's the only thing
that makes me easy."
"Don't, for humanity's sake, leave your poor men here on a winter's
night; it would be simply superfluous in the teeth of this
impossibility! The cold on this bleak place might do for some of them
before morning, or a false step in the dark send them over the cliff.
Not to speak of the ghost," added the justice, with a grim smile.
The supervisor gave an impromptu grunt, as if the latter sentence had
jarred on his nerves.
"That ghost tale is the worst part of it!" cried he. "Cold they are
used to, danger they don't mind; but there's not one of them but
shudders at the thought of seeing the ghost. I changed the men when I
found how it was; sent the old ones away, and brought fresh ones here;
well, will you believe me, justice, that in two days after they came
they were as bad as the old ones? That fellow, Tomlett, with two or
three more that congregate at the Mermaid, have told them the whole
tale. I can hardly get 'em on here since, after nightfall--though it's
only to walk along the plateau and back again."
Mr. Thornycroft looked straight out before him. The supervisor noticed
the grave change that had come to his face; and remembered that this,
or some other superstitious fear, was said to have killed the late
Mrs. Thornycroft. What with this story, what with the other deaths
spoken of, taking their rise remotely or unremotely in the ghost, what
with the uncomfortable feeling altogether that these things left on
the mind in dark and lonely moments, Mr. Supervisor Kyne might have
confessed, had he been honest enough, to not caring to stay himself on
the plateau at night. But for this fact, the place would have been
better guarded, since his men, in spite of the ghost, must have
remained on duty.
"Do you happen to know a little inlet of a spot lying near to
Jutpoint?" asked Mr. Thornycroft. "They say that used to be famous for
smuggling in the old days. If any is carried on still--a thing to be
doubted--there's where you must look for it."
"Ay, I've heard before of that place," remarked the supervisor. "They
say it's quiet enough now."
"I should have supposed most places were," said the justice, a mocking
intonation again in his tone, which rather told on the ears it was
meant for. "We revert to smuggling now as a thing of the past, not the
present. What fortunes were made at it!"
"And lost," said the supervisor.
Mr. Thornycroft shrugged his shoulders. "Were they? Through bad
management, then. Before that exposure of the custom-house frauds,
both merchants and officers lined their pockets. And do still, no
doubt."
They were slowly walking together, side by side on the brow of the
plateau, as they talked. Mr. Thornycroft stole a glance at his
companion. The supervisor's face was composed and cold; nothing to be
gathered from it.
"It has its charms, no doubt, this cheating of the revenue," resumed
the justice. "Were I a custom-house officer, and had the opportunity
offered me, I might be tempted to embrace it. Look at the toil of
these men--yours, for example--work, work, work and responsibility
perpetually; and then look at the miserable pittance of pay. Why, a
man may serve (and generally does) until he's fifty years of age,
before he has enough salary doled out to him to keep his family in
decent comfort."
"That's true," was the answer; "it keeps many of us from marrying. It
has kept me."
"Just so. One can't wonder that illegitimate practices are considered
justifiable. The world in its secret conscience exonerates you, I can
tell you that, Mr. Supervisor."
Mr. Supervisor walked along, measuring his steps, as if in thought;
but he did not answer.
"Why, how can it be otherwise?" continued the magistrate, warming with
his subject and his sympathy. "Put the case before us for a moment as
it used to be put. A merchant--Mr. Brown, let us say--has extensive
dealings with continental countries, and imports largely. Every
ship-load that comes for him must pay a duty of four hundred pounds,
more or less, to the customs. Brown speaks to the examining officer'
'You wink at this ship-load, don't see it; and we'll divide the duty
between us; you put two hundred in your pocket, and I'll put two.' Who
is there among us that would not accede? Not many. It enables the
poor, ill-paid gentleman to get a few comforts; and he does it."
"Yes; that is how many have been tempted."
"And I say we cannot blame them. No man with a spark of humanity
within his breast could give blame. Answer for yourself, Kyne: were it
possible that such a proposal could be made to you in these days,
would _you_ not fall in with it?"
"No," said the officer, in a low but decisive tone "I should not."
"No?" repeated Mr. Thornycroft, staring at him.
"It killed my father."
Mr. Thornycroft did not understand. The supervisor, looking straight
before him as if he were seeing past events in the distance,
explained, in a voice that was no louder than a whisper.
"He was tempted exactly as you have described; and yielded. When the
exposures took place at the London Customs, he was one of the officers
implicated, and made his escape abroad. There he died, yearning for
the land to which he could not return. The French doctors said that
unsatisfied yearning killed him; he had no other discoverable malady."
"What a curious thing!" exclaimed Mr. Thornycroft.
"There were some private, unhappy circumstances mixed with it. One
was, that his wife would not share in his exile. I could not; I had
already a place in the Customs. Just before he died I went over, and
he extorted a solemn promise from me never to do as he had done. I
never shall. No inducement possible to be offered would tempt me."
"It is a complete answer to the supposititious case propounded," said
the justice, laughing pleasantly.
"Supposititious, indeed!" remarked Mr. Kyne. "It could not occur in
these days."
"Certainly not. And _therefore_ your theory of present smuggling must
explode. I must be going. Will you come in to-night and dine with us,
Kyne? Copp is coming, and a few more. We've got the finest turbot, the
finest barrel of natives you ever tasted."
Inclination led Mr. Supervisor Kyne one way, duty another. He thought
he ought not to accept it; the dinners at the Red Court were always
prolonged until midnight at least, and his men would be safe to go off
the watch. But--a prime turbot! and all the rest of it! Mr. Kyne's
mouth watered.
"Thank you, sir; I'll come."
The evening dinner-gathering took place. Mr. Kyne and others, invited
to attend it, assembled in the usual unceremonious fashion, and were
very jolly to a late hour. Miss Thornycroft and Anna sat down to
table, quitting the gentlemen as soon as dinner was over. Ladies, as a
rule, were never invited to these feasts, but if Miss Thornycroft
appeared at table, the justice had no objection to her asking a
companion to join her. Generally speaking, however, her dinner on
these occasions was served to her alone.
"My darling, I am unable to take you home tonight; I--I cannot leave
my friends," whispered Isaac, finding himself by a happy chance alone
with Anna. Going into the drawing-room for a minute, he found his
sister had temporarily left it to get a book.
"Sarah is coming for me."
"Yes, I know."
His arms pressed jealously round her for the first time since they
parted, his face laid on hers, he took from her lips a shower of
impassioned kisses. Only for a moment. The sweeping trail of Miss
Thornycroft's silk dress was even then heard. When she entered, Anna
sat leaning her brow upon her raised fingers; Isaac was leaving the
room, carelessly humming a scrap of a song. Yes, it was an
unsatisfactory life at best--a wife and no wife; a heavy secret to
guard; apprehension always.
The days went on. Miss Thornycroft, defiantly pursuing her own will,
directly disobeying her father's command, did not write to stop the
arrival of her guests; and yet an opportunity offered her of doing so.
I fully believe that these opportunities of escape from the path of
evil are nearly always afforded once at least in every fresh
temptation, if we would but recognise and seize upon them.
It wanted but two days to that of the expected arrival, when a hasty
note was received from Miss Hunter saying she was prevented coming; it
concluded with these words: "My brother is undecided what to do; he
thinks you will not want him without me. Please drop him just one
line; or if he does not hear he will take it for granted that you
expect him."
_There_ was an opportunity!--"Just one line," and Mary Anne
Thornycroft would have had the future comfort of knowing that she had
(in substance at least) obeyed her father.
But she did not send it.