scarcely able to
support herself.

"I cannot go," she said, as he drew her arm within his. "Leave me
behind. They will not miss me. Nobody will miss me."

The agonised tone of these last words brought back the colour which Hope
had lost in the tempest of emotions, in which anger was uppermost. He
was no longer deadly pale when he said:

"Impossible. I cannot leave you. You must not stay behind. It is of
the utmost consequence that you should go. Cannot you? Do try. I will
place you beside Mrs Grey. Cannot you make the effort?"

She did make the effort. With desperate steadiness she stepped into the
boat where Mrs Grey was seated. She was conscious that Philip watched
to see what she would do, and then seated Maria and himself in the other
boat. Hope followed Margaret. If he had been in the same boat with
Enderby, the temptation to throw him overboard would have been too
strong.

Till they were past the weir and the lock, and all the erections
belonging to the village, and to the great firm which dignified it, the
boats were rowed. Conversation went on. The grey church steeple was
pronounced picturesque, as it rose above the trees; and the children
looked up at Dr Levitt, as if the credit of it by some means belonged
to him, the rector. Sydney desired his younger sisters not to trail
their hands through the water, as it retarded the passage of the boat.
The precise distance of the ruins from Deerbrook ferry was argued, and
Dr Levitt gave some curious traditions about the old abbey they were
going to see. Then towing took the place of rowing, and the party
became very quiet. The boat cut steadily through the still waters, the
slight ripple at the bows being the only sound which marked its
progress. Dr Levitt pointed with his stick to the "verdurous wall"
which sprang up from the brink of the river, every spray of the beech,
every pyramid of the larch, every leaf of the oak, and the tall column
of the occasional poplar, reflected true as the natural magic of light
and waters could make them. Some then wished the sun would come out,
without which it could scarcely be called seeing the woods. Others
tried to recognise the person who stood fishing under the great ash; and
it took a minute or two to settle whether it was a man or a boy; and two
minutes more to decide that it was nobody belonging to Deerbrook.
Margaret almost wondered that Edward could talk on about these things as
he did--so much i