"Don"t cry--don"t speak--don"t say anything for ever so long!" she said, with one gloved finger to her pretty mouth; "if there"s anything to get over--get over it without any fuss, my dear."
Mattie was silent for a while--she turned her head away and looked at the red coals. This was a meeting that she thought would come some day; that in her heart she did not blame Sidney Hinchford for promoting, although the danger of it rendered her uneasy.
"Farther away, Harriet," she murmured at last.
"I"m not afraid," said Harriet; "I don"t believe that I"m of a feverish sort, or that there"s any danger. If there were, I should have come all the same, and stopped just as long, after wheedling the address from Sid."
Ann Packet fidgeted about the room; she was jealous of her charge, fearful of Mattie becoming excited, and of Harriet Wesden talking too much to her. Harriet Wesden saw this.
"You may trust me with her, Ann--I will be very careful."
"I hope you will--I shouldn"t like the doctor to say I"d let you chatter her off into a fever again. You"ll take care, Mattie."
"Yes, Ann."
At the door she paused again.
"You allus were such a gal to talk when once set a going, Mattie--now doee be as careful as you can! When I come back from marketing, I"ll hope it"s all done atween you two."
Ann Packet withdrew; the two girls--we may say, despite the difference of position between them, the two friends--looked at each other for a short while longer. Mattie was the first to speak.
"Now you have come, Harriet, you must tell me all that has happened since we parted--every sc.r.a.p of news that affects you is always welcome to me."
"Shall I sum it up in three words, that will content you, Mattie--I am happy."
"I am so glad--so very glad! Harriet," she added more eagerly, "you do love him? It isn"t a fancy, like--like the others?"
"Mattie, I love him with my whole heart--I never loved before--I feel that the past was all romantic folly. You don"t know what a n.o.ble fellow he is--how kind and thoughtful!"
"Yes--I do."
"Ah! but you don"t know him as I know him; the truth of his inner self, the n.o.bleness of his character, the earnestness of his nature. Mattie, I feel that I have deceived him--that I should have told him all about Mr.
Darcy, and trusted in his generosity, in his knowledge of me, to believe it. It was a cruel promise that you wrung from me."
"Harriet, I was thinking of your own good name, and of the story that the world would make from yours. I think I was right."
We wiser people, with principles so much higher, think Mattie was wrong, as she thought herself, in the days that were ahead of her.
"And this Mr. Darcy, Harriet, have you seen or heard from him since?"
"I received one letter. I returned it to its writer unopened."
"That was right. And the Eveleighs, what do they know, do you think?"
"Nothing."
"Then we must be safe."
"We?" echoed Harriet; "when you are bearing the stigma of my indiscretion! Mattie, you went out that night in search of me."
"No matter," responded Mattie; "I must not talk too much. Let me hear you speak of all old friends--it"s like the old times back again to have you here."
"And they will come back."
"_Never!_" was the solemn reply.
"Not that tiresome shop, perhaps," said Harriet, "but the times like unto the old, and all the better for the difference. You know what a weak and sanguine woman I was."
"Well--yes."
"I am a strong and sanguine woman now, and there are good times I brood upon, and look forward to still. Shall I sketch you the picture?"
"If you will."
Mattie listened very anxiously; Harriet, with her bonnet in her lap, and her golden hair falling about her shoulders, sat steadfastly looking at our heroine.
"A little cottage somewhere in the country--a long, long way off from this London, which I dislike so much. Sid and I together, and you our faithful friend and housekeeper. Oh! that _will_ come true!"
Mattie shook her head.
"I think not."
"Why, you will not desert us!"
"When the time comes round for the cottage, I will give my answer. I think that--I--should--like to come some day--when you have children, perhaps, to take care of _them_. But it is a long, long while to look forward to--almost wicked to build upon, is it not?"
"I don"t see where the wickedness lies."
"And as for the country--why in the country, Harriet, when Sidney will have to work in London?"
"He may make his fortune and retire," she said, after a pause.
The secret of Sidney"s life was sacred, even from Mattie. Harriet could not dwell upon it without arousing a suspicion.
"I feel that we shall all be together some day--and now, before that day comes, let us speak of something else."
Harriet Wesden hastened to disburthen herself of all the thoughts which she had had concerning Mattie"s future mode of living; if it were dress-making, how Harriet could help her to increase the connection--and, whatever it was, how she, Harriet Wesden, must do her best for Mattie.
All this was very pleasant to our heroine, though it troubled her, and almost mastered her at times. Pleasant to witness the evidence of the old love, of no new love having ousted her from a place in Harriet"s heart. With the exception of honest Ann Packet, Mattie had earned no affection for herself, and had stood even isolated from it, until Harriet turned to her as her friend, trusted in her, and--did she ever dream it in the days when she ran barefooted through the London streets?--sought advice from her. And then, from that hour, Mattie studied Harriet, saw her weaknesses, and did her best to counteract them; moulded her--though neither knew it, or would have guessed it--anew, and helped to make the true woman which she was at that hour.
Mattie felt glad that she had been ill, now; her illness had brought Harriet to her side, and proved that she had lived in all her thoughts.
They were still talking together in the gloaming when the doctor called, bowed to Miss Wesden, and then paid attention to his patient.
"It"s very dark," said he, after an ineffectual attempt to see Mattie"s tongue; "but you"re better, I perceive. Keep still, don"t trouble yourself about a light, Miss Gray,"--Mattie, for some reason she could have scarcely explained to herself, had a.s.sumed the t.i.tle which Mrs.
Watts, in their last meeting, had bestowed upon her--"I have brought a friend to see you to-day, not knowing that you were engaged."
"Who is he?" Mattie inquired.