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Page 68
"Are you going to see Harry?"
"I may do such a thing."
"Is he sick?"
"No."
"I hope he will not get sick while you are there." And then some
passionate impulse took possession of her; her face glowed like a
flame, and her eyes scintillated like sparks. "If any thing happens
Harry while you are with him, I swear, by each separate Sandal that ever
lived, that you shall account for it!"
"Oh, you know, Sophia dear, this is too much! Leave the table, my love.
Your sister must be"--and he tapped his forehead; while Sophia, with a
look of annihilating scorn, drew her drapery tight around her, and
withdrew.
"What did I say? What do I think? What terror is in my heart? Oh, Harry,
Harry, Harry!"
She buried her face in her hands, and sat lost in woeful thought,--sat so
long that Phoebe the table-maid felt her delay to be unkind and
aggravating; especially when one of the chamber-maids came down for her
supper, and informed the rulers of the servants' hall that "Mrs. Julius
was crying up-stairs about Miss Charlotte falling out with her husband."
"Mercy on us! What doings we have to bide with!" and Ann shook her check
apron, and sat down with an air of nearly exhausted patience.
"You can't think what a taking Mr. Julius is in. He's going away
to-morrow."
"For good and all?"
"Not he. He'll be back again. He has had a falling-out with Miss
Charlotte."
"Poor lass! Say what you will, she has been hard set lately. I never
knew nor heard tell of her being flighty and fratchy before the squire's
trouble."
"Good hearts are plenty in good times, Ann Skelton. Miss Charlotte's
temper is past all the last few weeks, she is that off-and-on and
changeable like and spirity. Mrs. Julius says she does beat all."
"I don't pin my faith on what Mrs. Julius says. Not I."
In the east rooms the criticism was still more severe. Julius railed for
an hour ere he finally decided that he never saw a more suspicious,
unladylike, uncharitable, unchristianlike girl than Charlotte Sandal! "I
am glad to get away from her a little while," he cried; "how can she be
your sister, Sophia?"
So glad was he to get away, that he left before Charlotte came down in
the morning. Ann made him a cup of coffee, and received a shilling and
some suave words, and was quite sure after them that "Mr. Julius was the
finest gentleman that ever trod in shoe-leather." And Julius was not
above being gratified with the approbation and good wishes of servants;
and it gave him pleasure to leave in the little hurrah of their bows and
courtesies, their smiles and their good wishes.
He went without delay straight to the small Italian village in which
Harry had made his home. Harry's letters had prepared him for trouble
and poverty, but he had little idea of the real condition of the heir of
Sandal-Side. A few bare rooms in some dilapidated palace, grim with
faded magnificence, comfortless and dull, was the kind of place he
expected. He found him in a small cottage surrounded by a barren, sandy
patch of ground overgrown with neglected vines and vagabond weeds. The
interior was hot and untidy. On a couch a woman in the firm grip of
consumption was lying; an emaciated, feverish woman, fretful with acute
suffering. A little child, wan and waxy-looking, and apparently as ill
as its mother, wailed in a cot by her side. Signor Lanza was smoking
under a fig-tree in the neglected acre, which had been a vineyard or a
garden. Harry had gone into the village for some necessity; and when he
returned Julius felt a shock and a pang of regret for the dashing young
soldier squire that he had known as Harry Sandal.
He kissed his wife with passionate love and sorrow, and then turned to
Julius with that mute look of inquiry which few find themselves able to
resist.
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