Project Gutenberg's Christian's Mistake, by Dinah Maria Mulock Craik

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Title: Christian's Mistake

Author: Dinah Maria Mulock Craik

Release Date: January 13, 2005 [EBook #14687]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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E-text prepared by Robin Eugene Escovado

CHRISTIAN'S MISTAKE

BY

DINAH MARIA MULOCK CRAIK

Author of _John Halifax, Gentleman_,
&c., &c., &c.
New York Harper & Brothers,
Publishers Franklin Square.

Inscribed affectionately to
John and Lucy

Chapter 1.

_"So I will do my best a gude wife to be,
For Auld Robin Grey is vera kind to me."_

"I think this will do, my dear; just listen;" and in a mysterious half
whisper, good Mrs. Ferguson, wife of James Ferguson, the well-to-do
silversmith and jeweler, of High Street, Avonsbridge, read aloud from
the sheet of paper in her hand:

"'On the 21st instant, at the University Church, Avonsbridge, by the
Reverend John Smith, the Reverend Arnold Grey, D.D., Master of
Saint Bede's College, Avonsbridge, to Christian, only child of the late
Edward Oakley, Esq., of that place.' Will it do? Because, if so, James
will send it to 'The Times' at once."

"Better ask Dr. Grey first," answered the bride.

As she spoke, Dr. Grey turned round from the window where he had
been conversing--that is, responding to conversation--with Mr.
Ferguson, chiefly on the weather; for it was a snowy December day.

This precise moment, half an hour after his marriage--his second
marriage--is hardly a fair time to describe Dr. Arnold Grey; suffice it to
say that he was a gentleman apparently about forty-five, rather low in
stature, and spare in figure, with hair already thin and iron-gray. The
twenty-five years between him and his newly-married wife showed
plainly--only too plainly--as she stood, in all her gracefulness of
girlhood, which even her extreme pallor and a certain sharp, worn,
unnaturally composed look could not destroy. He seemed struck by
this. His face clouded over for a minute, and he slightly sighed. But
the pain, whatever it was, was only momentary. He looked like a man
who was not in