The Three BridesYonge, Charlotte M. (Charlotte Mary)
General
The Three Brides
Yonge, Charlotte M. (Charlotte Mary)
England -- Social life and customs -- 19th century -- Fiction; Marriage -- Fiction
Jenny came in with the rising sun, pale indeed, but another creature
after her rest and in the sight of the restful countenance that
greeted her with a smile. The moaning, hoarse voice was gone too,
it was a faint shadow of Herbert's own tones that said, "Is not this
good, Jenny? I didn't think to have seen it."
"My Herbert, you have given him back! You have given me the heart
to be glad!"
"You must go and see him," said Herbert.
Jenny looked wistful and undecided; but Julius entered to say that
she must come at once, for Archie must go back to London by the ten
o'clock train to an appointment, and could not return for two days.
Herbert smiled her away, for he was still in a state where it was
not possible to bear any engrossing of his head-nurse, and the
lover's absence was, even to his unselfishness, good news.
Rosamond could not refrain from the pleasure of peeping down the
little dark stair as Archie and his Jenny met in the doorway, and
she walked demurely in their rear, wondering whether other eyes saw
as much as she did in the manner in which Jenny hung on his arm.
She left them to their dewy walk in the Rectory garden to the last
minute at which breakfast could be swallowed, and told Jenny that
she was to drive him in the pony-carriage to Hazlett's Gate; she
would take care of Herbert.
"You ought to be asleep, you know," said Jenny.
"My dear, I couldn't sleep! There's a great deal better than sleep!
Is not Herbert going to get well? and aren't you jolly again and
Archie back again? Sleep!--why I want to have wings and clap them--
and more than all, is not Mr. Charnock off and away to-morrow?
Sleep indeed!--I should like to see myself so stupid."
"Mr. Charnock?" interrogatively said Archie.
"The head of the family--the original Charnock of Dunstone," said
Rosamond, who was in wild spirits, coming on a worn-out body and
mind, and therefore perfectly unguarded. "Don't shake your head at
me, Jenny, Archie is one of the family, and that makes you so, and I
must tell you of his last performance. You know he is absolutely
certain that his dear daughter is more infallible than all the
Popes, even since the Council, or than anybody but himself, and that
whatever goes wrong here is the consequence of Julius's faith in Dr.
Easterby. So, when poor Cecil, uneasy in her mind, began asking
about the illness at Wil'sbro', he enlivened her with a prose about
misjudging, through well-intentioned efforts of clerical
philanthropy to interfere with the sanitary condition of the town--
so that wells grew tainted, &c., all from ignorant interference.
Poor man he heard a little sob, and looked round, and there was
Cecil in a dead faint. He set all the bells ringing, and sent an
express for me."
"But wasn't he furious with Anne for mentioning drains at all?"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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