But I was out last week much later.'
Margaret was thankful when the parting was over—the parting from the dead mother and the living father.
She hurried Frederick into the cab, in order to shorten a scene which she saw was so bitterly painful to her father, who would accompany his son as he took his last look at his mother.
Partly in consequence of this, and partly owing to one of the very common mistakes in the
'Railway Guide' as to the times when trains arrive at the smaller stations, they found, on reaching Outwood, that they had nearly twenty minutes to spare.
The booking-office was not open, so they could not even take the ticket.
They accordingly went down the flight of steps that led to the level of the ground below the railway.
There was a broad cinder-path diagonally crossing a field which lay along-side of the carriage-road, and they went there to walk backwards and forwards for the few minutes they had to spare.
Margaret's hand lay in Frederick's arm.
He took hold of it affectionately.
'Margaret!
I am going to consult Mr. Lennox as to the chance of exculpating myself, so that I may return to England whenever I choose, more for your sake than for the sake of any one else.
I can't bear to think of your lonely position if anything should happen to my father.
He looks sadly changed—terribly shaken.
I wish you could get him to think of the Cadiz plan, for many reasons.
What could you do if he were taken away?
You have no friend near.
We are curiously bare of relations.'
Margaret could hardly keep from crying at the tender anxiety with which Frederick was bringing before her an event which she herself felt was not very improbable, so severely had the cares of the last few months told upon Mr. Hale.
But she tried to rally as she said:
'There have been such strange unexpected changes in my life during these last two years, that I feel more than ever that it is not worth while to calculate too closely what I should do if any future event took place.
I try to think only upon the present.'
She paused; they were standing still for a moment, close on the field side of the stile leading into the road; the setting sun fell on their faces.
Frederick held her hand in his, and looked with wistful anxiety into her face, reading there more care and trouble than she would betray by words.
She went on:
'We shall write often to one another, and I will promise—for I see it will set your mind at ease—to tell you every worry I have.
Papa is'—she started a little, a hardly visible start—but Frederick felt the sudden motion of the hand he held, and turned his full face to the road, along which a horseman was slowly riding, just passing the very stile where they stood. Margaret bowed; her bow was stiffly returned.
'Who is that?' said Frederick, almost before he was out of hearing.
Margaret was a little drooping, a little flushed, as she replied:
'Mr. Thornton; you saw him before, you know.'
'Only his back.
He is an unprepossessing-looking fellow.
What a scowl he has!'
'Something has happened to vex him,' said Margaret, apologetically.
'You would not have thought him unprepossessing if you had seen him with mamma.'
'I fancy it must be time to go and take my ticket.
If I had known how dark it would be, we wouldn't have sent back the cab, Margaret.'
'Oh, don't fidget about that.
I can take a cab here, if I like; or go back by the rail-road, when I should have shops and people and lamps all the way from the Milton station-house.
Don't think of me; take care of yourself.
I am sick with the thought that Leonards may be in the same train with you.
Look well into the carriage before you get in.'
They went back to the station.
Margaret insisted upon going into the full light of the flaring gas inside to take the ticket.
Some idle-looking young men were lounging about with the stationmaster.
Margaret thought she had seen the face of one of them before, and returned him a proud look of offended dignity for his somewhat impertinent stare of undisguised admiration. She went hastily to her brother, who was standing outside, and took hold of his arm.
'Have you got your bag?
Let us walk about here on the platform,' said she, a little flurried at the idea of so soon being left alone, and her bravery oozing out rather faster than she liked to acknowledge even to herself.
She heard a step following them along the flags; it stopped when they stopped, looking out along the line and hearing the whizz of the coming train.
They did not speak; their hearts were too full.