The Clever Woman of the Family

"By the sound of your move across the room, and the stream of talk I

heard above must be enough to exhaust any one."

"She thinks badly of that poor child," said Rachel, her voice trembling.

"My dear, it would take a good deal to make me uneasy about anything I

heard in that voice."

"And if he lives, she is to have the charge of him," added Rachel.

"That is another matter on which I would suspend my fears," said Mr.

Clare. "Come out, and take a turn in the peacock path. You want air more

than rest. So you have been talked to death."

"And I am afraid she is gone to talk Alick to death! I wonder when Alick

will come home," she proceeded, as they entered on the path. "She says

Colonel Keith had a telegram about the result of the trial, but she does

not know what it was, nor indeed who was tried."

"Alick will not keep you in doubt longer than he can help," said Mr.

Clare.

"You know all about it;" said Rachel. "The facts every one must know,

but I mean that which led to them."

"Alick told me you had suffered very much."

"I don't know whether it is a right question, but if it is, I should

much like to know what Alick did say. I begged him to tell you all, or

it would not have been fair towards you to bring me here."

"He told me that he knew you had been blind and wilful, but that your

confidence had been cruelly abused, and you had been most unselfish

throughout."

"I did not mean so much what I had done as what I am--what I was."

"The first time he mentioned you, it was as one of the reasons that he

wished to take our dear Bessie to Avonmouth. He said there was a girl

there of a strong spirit, independent and thorough-going, and thinking

for herself. He said, 'to be sure, she generally thinks wrong, but

there's a candour and simplicity about her that make her wildest

blunders better than parrot commonplace,' and he thought your reality

might impress his sister. Even then I gathered what was coming."

"And how wrong and foolish you must have thought it."

"I hoped I might trust my boy's judgment."

"Indeed, you could not think it worse for him than I did; but I was ill

and weak, and could not help letting Alick do what he would; but I have

never understood it. I told him how unsettled my views were, and he did

not seem to mind--"

"My dear, may I ask if this sense of being unsettled is with you still?"

"I don't know! I had no power to read or think for a long time, and now,

since I have been here, I hope it has not been hypocrisy, for going on

in your way and his has been very sweet to me, and made me feel as I

used when I was a young girl, with only an ugly dream between. I don't

like to look at it, and yet that dream was my real life that I made for

myself."