Mrs. Vincent gave a convulsive start, which shook the table against
which she was leaning, and fell to shivering as if in a fit of ague.
"Oh, Arthur, Arthur, what are you saying? Another Sunday!" she
exclaimed, with a cry of despair. To live another day seemed impossible
in that horror. But self-restraint was natural to the woman who had
been, as she said, a minister's wife for thirty years. She clasped her
hands tight, and took up her burden again. "I will see Mr. Beecher when
he comes, dear, and--and speak to him," she said, with a sigh, "and I
will see the Tozers and--and your people, Arthur; and if it should be
God's will to keep us so long in suspense, if--if--I can keep alive,
dear, I may be of some use. Oh, Arthur, Arthur, the Lord have pity upon
us! if my darling comes back, will she come here or will she go home?
Don't you think she will come here? If I go back to Lonsdale, I will not
be able to rest for thinking she is at Carlingford; and if I stay--oh,
Arthur, where do you think Susan will go to? She might be afraid to see
you, and think you would be angry, but she never could distrust her poor
mother, who was the first to put her in danger; and to think of my dear
child going either there or here, and not finding me, Arthur! My dear,
you are not eating anything. You can never go through it all without
some support. For my sake, try to eat a little, my own boy; and oh,
Arthur, what must I do?"
"These Tozers and people will worry you to death if you stay here," said
the minister, with an impatient sigh, as he thought of his own
difficulties; "but I must not lose time by going back with you to
Lonsdale, and you must not travel by yourself, and this is more in the
way, whatever happens. Send word to Lonsdale that you are to have a
message by telegraph immediately--without a moment's loss of time--if
she comes back."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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