sake of another man's children. Think how
you'd abuse any poor fellow who was willing
to take what he could get to keep his own
children. You and your Union would soon
be down upon him. No! no! if it's only
for the recollection of the way in which you've
used the poor knobsticks before now, I say No
to your question. I will not give you work.
I won't say I don't believe your pretext for
coming and asking for work; I know nothing
about it. It may be true, or it may not. It
is a very unlikely story, at any rate. Let me
pass. I will not give you work. There's
your answer."

" I hear, sir. I would na ha' troubled yo
but that I were bid to come, by one as seemed
to think yo'd getten some soft place in yo'r
heart. She were mistook and I were misled.
But I'm not the first man as is misled by a
woman.

"Tell her to mind her own business the
next time, instead of taking up your time and
mine too. I believe women are at the bottom
of every plague in this world. Be off with
you."

" I'm obleeged to yo for a' yo'r kindness,
measter, and most of a' for yo'r civil way o'
saying good-bye."

Mr. Thornton did not deign a reply. But
looking out of the window a minute after
he was struck with the lean bent figure
going out of the yard ; the heavy walk
was in strange contrast with the resolute
clear determination of the man to speak to
him. He crossed to the porter's lodge :

"How long has that man Higgins been
waiting to speak to me ? "

" He was outside the gate before eight
o'clock, sir. I think he's been there ever
since."

" And it is now — ? "

" Just one, sir."

"Five hours," thought Mr. Thornton;
"it's a long time for a man to wait, doing
nothing but first hoping and then fearing."

CHAPTER THE THIRTY-NINTH.

MARGARET shut herself up in her own
room after she had quitted Mrs. Thornton.
She began to walk backwards and forwards
in her old habitual way of showing agitation;
but then, remembering that in that slightly-
built house every step was heard from one
room to another, she sate down until she
heard Mrs. Thornton go safely out of the
house. She forced herself to recollect all
the conversation that had passed between
them; speech by speech she compelled her
memory to go through with it. At the end
she rose up, and said to herself, in a melancholy
tone:

"At any rate, her words do not touch me;
they fall off from me; for I am innocent of
all the motives she attributes to me. But
still it is hard to think that any one—any
woman — can believe all this of another so
easily. It is hard and sad. Where I have
done wrong, she does not accuse me — she
does not know. He never told her : I
might have known he would not ! "

She lifted up her head, as if she took
pride in any delicacy of feeling which Mr.
Thornton had shown. Then, as a new
thought came across her, she pressed her
hands tightly together :

" He, too, must take poor Frederick for
some lover." (She blushed as the word
passed through, her mind.) "I see it now.
It is not merely that he knows of my falsehood,
but he believes that some one else
cares for me : and that I —— Oh dear ! — oh
dear ! "What shall I do ? What do I mean ?
Why do I care what he thinks, beyond the
mere loss of his good opinion as regards my
telling the truth or not ? I cannot tell.
But I am very miserable ! Oh, how
unhappy this last year has been ! I have
passed out of childhood into old age. I have
had no youth — no womanhood ; the hopes of
womanhood have closed for me— for I shall
never marry ; and I anticipate cares and
sorrows just as if I were an old woman, and
with the same fearful spirit. I am weary of
this continual call upon me for strength. I
could bear up for papa ; because that is a
natural, pious duty. And I think I could
bear up against — at any rate, I could have
the energy to resent, Mrs. Thornton's unjust,
impertinent suspicions. But it is hard to
feel how completely he must misunderstand
me. What has happened to make me so
morbid to-day ? I do not know. I only
know I cannot help it. I must give way
sometimes. No, I will not though," said
she, springing to her feet. " I will not — I
will not think of myself and my own position.
I won't examine into my own feelings. It
would be of no use now. Some time, if I
live to be an old woman, I may sit over the
fire, and, looking into the embers, see the
life that might have been."

All this time she was hastily putting on
her things to go out, only stopping from time
to time to wipe her eyes, with an impatience
of gesture at the tears that would come, in
spite of all her bravery.

"I dare say, there's many a woman makes
as sad a mistake as I have done, and only
finds it out too late. And how proudly and
impertinently I spoke to him that day! But
I did not know then. It has come upon me
little by little, and I don't know where it
began. " Now I won't give way. I shall find
it difficult to behave in the same way to him
with this miserable consciousness upon me;
but I will be very calm and very quiet, and
say very little. But, to be sure, I may not see
him; he keeps out of our way evidently.
That would be worse than all. And yet no
wonder he avoids me, believing what he
must about me."

She went out, going rapidly towards the
country, and trying to drown reflection by
swiftness of motion.