"Oh dear! a drunken infidel weaver!"
said Mr. Hale to himself, in dismay. But to
Margaret he only said, "If your mother
goes to sleep, be sure you come directly."

Margaret went into her mother's room.
Mrs. Hale lifted herself up from a doze.

"When did you write to Frederick, Margaret?
Yesterday, or the day before?"

"Yesterday, mamma."

"Yesterday. And the letter went?"

"Yes. I took it myself."

"Oh, Margaret, I'm so afraid of his coming!
If he should be recognised! If he should be
taken! If he should be executed, after all
these years that he has kept away and lived
in safety! I keep falling asleep and dreaming
that he is caught and being tried."

"Oh, mamma, don't be afraid. There will
be some risk, no doubt; but we will lessen it
as much as ever we can. And it is so little!
Now, if we were at Helstone, there would be
twenty—a hundred times as much. There
everybody would remember him; and if
there was a stranger known to be in the
house, they would be sure to guess it was
Frederick; while here, nobody knows or
cares for us enough to notice what we do.
Dixon will keep the door like a dragon—
won't you, Dixon—while he is here?"

"They'll be clever if they come in past me!"
said Dixon, showing her teeth at the bare
idea.

"And he need not go out, except in the
dusk, poor fellow!"

"Poor fellow!" echoed Mrs. Hale. "But I
almost wish you had not written. Would it
be too late to stop him if you wrote again,
Margaret?"

"I'm afraid it would, mamma," said Margaret,
remembering the urgency with which
she had entreated him to come directly, if he
wished to see his mother alive.

"I always dislike that doing things in such
a hurry," said Mrs. Hale.

Margaret was silent.

"Come now, ma'am," said Dixon, with a
kind of cheerful authority, "you know seeing
Master Frederick is just the very thing
of all others you're longing for. And I'm
glad Miss Margaret wrote off straight
without shilly-shallying. I've had a great
mind to do it myself. And we'll keep him
snug, depend upon it. There's only Martha
in the house that would not do a good deal to
save him on a pinch; and I've been thinking
she might go and see her mother just at
that very time. She's been saying once or
twice she should like to go, for her mother
has had a stroke since she came here; only
she didn't like to ask. But I'll see about
her being safe off, as soon as we know when
he comes, God bless him! So take your tea,
ma'am, in comfort, and trust to me."

Mrs. Hale did trust in Dixon more than in
Margaret. Dixon's words quieted her for
the time. Margaret poured out the tea in
silence, trying to think of something agreeable
to say; but her thoughts made answer
something like Daniel O'Rourke, when the
man-in-the-moon asked him to get off his
reaping-hook, "The more you ax us, the
more we won't stir." The more she tried to
think of something—anything besides the
danger to which Frederick would be exposed
—the more closely her imagination clung to
the unfortunate idea presented to her. Her
mother prattled with Dixon, and seemed to
have utterly forgotten the possibility of
Frederick being tried and executed—utterly
forgotten that at her wish, if by Margaret's
deed, he was summoned into this danger.
Her mother was one of those who throw out
terrible possibilities, miserable probabilities,
unfortunate chances of all kinds, as a rocket
throws out sparks; but if the sparks light
on some combustible matter, they smoulder
first, and burst out into a frightful flame at
last. Margaret was glad when, her filial
duties gently and carefully performed, she
could go down into the study. She
wondered how her father and Nicholas Higgins
had got on.

In the first place, the decorous, kind-hearted,
simple, old-fashioned gentleman, had
unconsciously called out, by his own refinement
and courteousness of manner, all the
latent courtesy in the other.

Mr. Hale treated all his fellow-creatures
alike: it never entered into his head to make
any difference because of their rank. He placed
a chair for Nicholas; stood up till he, at Mr.
Hale's request, took a seat; and called him,
invariably, "Mr. Higgins," instead of the
curt "Nicholas" or "Higgins," to which the
"drunken infidel weaver " had been accustomed.
But Nicholas was neither an habitual
drunkard nor a thorough infidel. He drank
to drown care, as he would have himself
expressed it; and he was infidel so far as he
had never yet found any form of faith to
which he could attach himself, heart and
soul.

Margaret was a little surprised, and very
much pleased, when she found her father and
Higgins in earnest conversation,—each speaking
with gentle politeness to the other, however
their opinions might clash. Nicholas—
clean, tidied (if only at the pump-trough), and
quiet-spoken—was a new creature to her,
who had only seen him in the rough
independence of his own hearthstone. He had
"slicked" his hair down with the fresh
water; he had adjusted his neck-handkerchief,
and borrowed an odd candle-end to
polish his clogs with; and there he sat,
enforcing some opinion on her father, with a
strong Darkshire accent, it is true, but with
a lowered voice, and a good earnest
composure on his face. Her father, too, was
interested in what his companion was saying.
He looked round as she came in, smiled, and
quietly gave her his chair, and then sat down
afresh as quickly as possible, and with a little
bow of apology to his guest for the interruption.