FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88  
89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   >>   >|  
t be so long without coming to see me again, dear heart," cried Rachel Ray, standing outside her door. "No, no, I will come soon," answered Betty. Johnstone placed her in the saddle. "A good gallop over the downs will bring back the colour to your cheek," he said softly. "You are so white and cold." "There is something ill-omened in all here," said Betty with a slight shiver. "Here, Nora," cried Johnstone, flinging her a piece of gold. "This is to make up for the loss of that silver sixpence." The girl laughed loud and shrilly. "Ah! ah!" she cried after them. "The good gentleman! the brave fellow! For this I would follow you! aye! follow you, my lad, from Belton to Tyburn Hill!" CHAPTER IV. "It is then true, my Betty? And I am to wish you joy?" cried Mary Jones, with both hands outstretched. "It is true," answered Betty, her lips parted in a smile of sunshiny happiness. "Congratulate me, Mary; yes, wish me joy, for there is no happier woman to-day between the Northern and Southern seas." "I am glad to see you so happy, dear child!" cried Mary affectionately, but there was something pinched and starved in her voice. Ah, pity for those who possess the capacity for love and yet must go hungry to their dying day! This odd want is none the less bitter that it meets with scant sympathy in this hard world. In the breast of many an unsought woman lies a wealth of wasted treasure, treasure which no one has cared to seek, and yet what a treasure it might have been! Mary Jones's heart had grown somewhat starved, but it was the heart of a loving woman still, and when the bright sunshine of her young friend's happiness shed its light on her soul, it awakened an echo of old dead days, and swelled it with sympathy. "Sit down, sweet one," she said, drawing Betty down on the sofa beside her. "Tell me all about it. When did he ask you to be his wife?" "This morning, Mary, only this morning; but it seems as if years had passed since then." "And what says Mr. Ives? Does he welcome the stranger who takes from him his only child?" "Not far, Mary--but two miles away--and my father is always to live with me, if he so will it, so says Mr. Johnstone." "But is he pleased?" asked Mary, with a little persistence. "Yes, he is well pleased; he already loves him as a son. Mary, perhaps the thing that most readily won my heart was his reverence and tender courtesy to my father." "I can believe it, Betty
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88  
89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

Johnstone

 

treasure

 

morning

 
happiness
 
sympathy
 

starved

 
answered
 

follow

 

father

 

pleased


sunshine
 

friend

 

unsought

 

wealth

 

wasted

 
breast
 

loving

 

bright

 

persistence

 
tender

reverence

 
courtesy
 

readily

 

drawing

 

swelled

 

awakened

 

stranger

 
passed
 

Southern

 

omened


slight

 

shiver

 

flinging

 

sixpence

 

laughed

 

shrilly

 

silver

 

softly

 

standing

 

Rachel


coming

 

colour

 

saddle

 

gallop

 

possess

 

capacity

 
pinched
 

affectionately

 

bitter

 

hungry