ne here, I
am sure." Twenty people stepped forward at the word. Margaret parted
with her heavy fur tippet, accepted a long cloth cloak from a poor
woman, to throw over her wet clothes, selected Mr Jones, the butcher,
for her escort, sent Sydney forward with directions to Morris to warm
her bed, and then she set forth homeward. Mr Hope and half a dozen
more would see her across the ice; and by the time she had reached the
other bank, she was able to walk very much as if nothing had happened.

Mr Hope had perfectly recovered his composure before he reached the
somewhat distant pond where Hester and the Greys were watching sliding
as good as could be seen within twenty miles. It had reached
perfection, like everything else, in Deerbrook.

"What! tired already?" said Hester to her husband. "What have you done
with your skates?"

"Oh, I have left them somewhere there, I suppose." He drew her arm
within his own. "Come, my dear, let us go home. Margaret is gone."

"Gone! Why? Is not she well? It is not so very cold."

"She has got wet, and she has gone home to warm herself." Hester did
not wait to speak again to the Greys when she comprehended that her
sister had been in the river. Her husband was obliged to forbid her
walking so fast, and assured her all the way that there was nothing to
fear. Hester reproached him for his coolness.

"You need not reproach me," said he. "I shall never cease to reproach
myself for letting her go where she did." And yet his heart told him
that he had only acted according to his deliberate design of keeping
aloof from all Margaret's pursuits and amusements that were not shared
with her sister. And as for the risk, he had seen fifty people walking
across the ice this very morning. Judging by the event, however, he
very sincerely declared that he should never forgive himself for having
left her.

When they reached home, Margaret was quite warm and comfortable, and her
hair drying rapidly under Morris's hands. Hester was convinced that
everybody might dine as usual. Margaret herself came down-stairs to
tea; and the only consequence of the accident seemed to be, that Charles
was kept very busy opening the door to inquirers how Miss Ibbotson was
this evening.

It made Hope uneasy to perceive how much Margaret remembered of what had
passed around her in the midst of the bustle of the morning. If she was
still aware of some circumstances that she mentioned, might she not