sent by the carrier. He brought it to the farm betimes that morning,
and along with it he brought a letter or two that had arrived since I
had left. I was talking to cousin Holman--about my mother's ways of
making bread, I remember; cousin Holman was questioning me, and had got
me far beyond my depth--in the house-place, when the letters were
brought in by one of the men, and I had to pay the carrier for his
trouble before I could look at them. A bill--a Canadian letter! What
instinct made me so thankful that I was alone with my dear unobservant
cousin? What made me hurry them away into my coat-pocket? I do not
know. I felt strange and sick, and made irrelevant answers, I am
afraid. Then I went to my room, ostensibly to carry up my boxes. I sate
on the side of my bed and opened my letter from Holdsworth. It seemed
to me as if I had read its contents before, and knew exactly what he
had got to say. I knew he was going to be married to Lucille Ventadour;
nay, that he was married; for this was the 5th of July, and he wrote
word that his marriage was fixed to take place on the 29th of June. I
knew all the reasons he gave, all the raptures he went into. I held the
letter loosely in my hands, and looked into vacancy, yet I saw the
chaffinch's nest on the lichen-covered trunk of an old apple-tree
opposite my window, and saw the mother-bird come fluttering in to feed
her brood,--and yet I did not see it, although it seemed to me
afterwards as if I could have drawn every fibre, every feather. I was
stirred up to action by the merry sound of voices and the clamp of
rustic feet coming home for the mid-day meal. I knew I must go down to
dinner; I knew, too, I must tell Phillis; for in his happy egotism, his
new-fangled foppery, Holdsworth had put in a P.S., saying that he
should send wedding-cards to me and some other Hornby and Eltham
acquaintances, and 'to his kind friends at Hope Farm'. Phillis had
faded away to one among several 'kind friends'. I don't know how I got
through dinner that day. I remember forcing myself to eat, and talking
hard; but I also recollect the wondering look in the minister's eyes.
He was not one to think evil without cause; but many a one would have
taken me for drunk. As soon as I decently could I left the table,
saying I would go out for a walk. At first I must have tried to stun
reflection by rapid walking, for I had lost myself on the high
moorlands far beyond the familiar gorse-covered common, befor