The Squire's DaughterHocking, Silas K. (Silas Kitto)
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The Squire's Daughter
Hocking, Silas K. (Silas Kitto)
Landlord and tenant -- Fiction; Love stories; Social classes -- England -- Fiction
At first he almost resented the humiliation. Then another feeling took
possession of him, a feeling of admiration, almost of reverence. Here
was nobleness such as he himself had failed to reach. Here was one high
in the social scale, and higher still in grace and goodness,
condescending to him, who had indirectly been the cause of all her
suffering. Then in a moment his mood changed again to resentment. This
was the daughter of the man who had broken his father's heart. But a
moment ago he had looked into his father's hopeless, suffering eyes, and
felt as though it would be the sweetest drop of his life if he could
make John Hamblyn and all his tribe suffer as he had made them suffer.
But even as he reached out his hard brown hand to take the pale and
wasted one that was extended to him, the pendulum swung back once more;
the better and nobler feeling came back. The large sad eyes that looked
up into his had in them no flash of pride or arrogance. The smile that
played over her wan, pale face seemed as richly benevolent as the
sunshine of God. Possibly she knew nothing of the calamity that had
overtaken him and his, a calamity that her father might have so
wonderfully lightened, and at scarcely any cost to himself, had he been
so disposed. But it was not his place to blame the child for what her
father had done or left undone.
The soft, thin fingers were enveloped in his big strong palm, and then
his eyes filled. A lump came up into his throat and prevented him from
speaking. Never in all his life before had he seemed so little master of
himself.
Then a low, sweet voice broke the silence, and all his self-possession
came back to him.
"I am so glad I have met you."
"Yes?" he questioned.
"I wanted to thank you for saving my life."
He dropped his eyes slowly, and a hot wave swept over him from head to
foot.
"Dr. Barrow says if you had not found me when you did I should have
died." And she looked at him as if expecting an answer. But he did not
reply or even raise his head.
"And you carried me such a long distance, too," she went on, after a
pause; "and I heard Dr. Barrow tell the nurse that you bound up my head
splendidly."
"You were not much to carry," he said, raising his head suddenly.
"But--but you are less now." And his voice sank almost to a whisper.
"I have grown very thin," she said, with a wan smile. "But the doctor
says I shall get all right again with time and patience."
"I hoped you would have got well much sooner," he said, looking timidly
into her face. "I have suffered a good deal during your illness."
"You?" she questioned, raising her eyebrows. "Why?"
"Because if I had not been surly and boorish, the accident would not
have happened. If you had died, I should never have forgiven myself."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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