could not eat, though she made
efforts to do so. Edward and Margaret talked a great deal about skating
and snow-men, and about the fire at Blickley; but they came to a stand
at last. The foot-boy went about on tiptoe, and shut the door as if he
had been in a sick-room; and this made Hester's short sobs only the more
audible. It was a relief when the oranges were on the table at last,
and the door closed behind the dinner and the boy. Margaret began to
peel an orange for her sister, and Edward poured out a glass of wine; he
placed it before her, and then drew his chair to her side, saying--

"Now, my dear, let us get to the bottom of all this distress."

"No, do not try, Edward. Never mind me! I shall get the better of
this, by-and-by: only let me alone."

"Thank you!" said Hope, smiling. "I like to see people reasonable! I
am to see you sorrowing in this way, and for very sufficient cause, and
I am neither to mind your troubles nor my own, but to be as merry as if
nothing had happened! Is not this reasonable, Margaret?"

"For very sufficient cause!" said Hester, eagerly.

"Yes, indeed; for very sufficient cause. It must be a painful thing to
you to find my neighbours beginning to dislike me; to have the
tradespeople impertinent to you on my account; to see my patients leave
me, and call in somebody from a distance, in the face of all Deerbrook.
It must make you anxious to think what is to become of us, if the
discontent continues and spreads: and it must be a bitter disappointment
to you to find that to be my wife is not to be so happy as we expected.
Here is cause enough for tears."

In the midst of her grief, Hester looked up at her husband with an
expression of gratitude and tenderness which consoled him for her.

"I will not answer for it," he continued, "but that we may all three sit
down to weep together, one of these days."

"And then," said Margaret, "Hester will be the first to cheer up and
comfort us."

"I have no doubt of it," replied Hope. "Meantime, is there anything
that you would have had done otherwise by me? Was I right or not to
vote? and was there anything wrong in my manner of doing it? Is there
any cause whatever for repentance?"

"None, none," cried Hester. "You have been right throughout. I glory
in all you do."

"To me it seems that you could not have done otherwise," observed
Margaret. "It was a simple, unavoidable act, done with the simplicity
of affairs which happ