“Of course I would. Ain’t we sisters, Pris?”
“I shall not be so much your sister as he will be your husband. Besides, I hate to take things. When Hugh sends money, and for mamma’s sake it is accepted, I always feel uneasy while it lasts, and think that that plague of an indigestion ought to come upon me also. Do you remember the lamb that came when you went away? It made me so sick.”
“But, Priscilla;—isn’t that morbid?”
“Of course it is. You don’t suppose I really think it grand. I am morbid. But I am strong enough to live on, and not get killed by the morbidity. Heaven knows how much more there may be of it;—forty years, perhaps, and probably the greater portion of that absolutely alone;—”
“No;—you’ll be with us then—if it should come.”
“I think not, Dolly. Not to have a hole of my own would be intolerable to me. But, as I was saying, I shall not be unhappy. To enjoy life, as you do, is I suppose out of the question for me. But I have a satisfaction when I get to the end of the quarter and find that there is not half-a-crown due to anyone. Things get dearer and dearer, but I have a comfort even in that. I have a feeling that I should like to bring myself to the straw a day.” Of course there were offers made of aid—offers which were rather prayers—and plans suggested of what might be done between Brooke and Hugh; but Priscilla declared that all such plans were odious to her. “Why should you be unhappy about us?” she continued. “We will come and see you—at least I will—perhaps once in six months, and you shall pay for the railway ticket; only I won’t stay, because of the gown.”
“Is not that nonsense, Pris?”
“Just at present it is, because mamma and I have both got new gowns for the wedding. Hugh sent them, and ever so much money to buy bonnets and gloves.”
“He is to be married himself soon—down at a place called Monkhams. Nora is staying there.”
“Yes;—with a lord,” said Priscilla. “We shan’t have to go there, at any rate.”
“You liked Nora when she was here?”
“Very much;—though I thought her self-willed. But she is not worldly, and she is conscientious. She might have married that lord herself if she would. I do like her. When she comes to you at Exeter, if the wedding gown isn’t quite worn out, I shall come and see her. I knew she liked him when she was here, but she never said so.”
“She is very pretty, is she not? He sent me her photograph.”
“She is handsome rather than pretty. I wonder why it is that you two should be married, and so grandly married, and that I shall never, never have anyone to love.”
“Oh, Priscilla, do not say that. If I have a child will you not love it?”
“It will be your child;—not mine. Do not suppose that I complain. I know that it is right. I know that you ought to be married and I ought not. I know that there is not a man in Devonshire who would take me, or a man in Devonshire whom I would accept. I know that I am quite unfit for any other kind of life than this. I should make any man wretched, and any man would make me wretched. But why is it so? I believe that you would make any man happy.”
“I hope to make Brooke happy.”
“Of course you will, and therefore you deserve it. We’ll go home now, dear, and get mamma’s things ready for the great day.”
On the afternoon before the great day all the visitors were to come, and during the forenoon old Miss Stanbury was in a great fidget. Luckily for Dorothy, her own preparations were already made, so that she could give her time to her aunt without injury to herself. Miss Stanbury had come to think of herself as though all the reality of her life had passed away from her. Every resolution that she had formed had been broken. She had had the great enemy of her life, Barty Burgess, in the house with her upon terms that were intended to be amicable, and had arranged with him a plan for the division of the family property. Her sister-in-law, whom in the heyday of her strength she had chosen to regard as her enemy, and with whom even as yet there had been no reconciliation, was about to become her guest, as was also Priscilla—whom she had ever disliked almost as much as she had respected. She had quarrelled utterly with Hugh—in such a manner as to leave no possible chance of a reconciliation—and he also was about to be her guest. And then, as to her chosen heir, she was now assisting him in doing the only thing, as to which she had declared that if he did do it, he should not be her heir. As she went about the house, under an idea that such a multiplicity of persons could not be housed and fed without superhuman exertion, she thought of all this, and could not help confessing to herself that her life had been very vain. It was only when her eyes rested on Dorothy, and she saw how supremely happy was the one person whom she had taken most closely to her heart, that she could feel that she had done anything that should not have been left undone. “I think I’ll sit down now, Dorothy,” she said, “or I shan’t be able to be with
