“I will come over early in the morning then, and see how you are going on.”

As soon as Thomas returned with good news of Mary’s recovery, I left him, and went home to tell my sister, and arrange for the night.  We carried back with us what things we could think of to make the two patients as comfortable as possible; for, as regarded Catherine, now that she would let her fellows help her, I was even anxious that she should feel something of that love about her which she had so long driven from her door.  I felt towards her somewhat as towards a new-born child, for whom this life of mingled weft must be made as soft as its material will admit of; or rather, as if she had been my own sister, as indeed she was, returned from wandering in weary and miry ways, to taste once more the tenderness of home.  I wanted her to read the love of God in the love that even I could show her.  And, besides, I must confess that, although the result had been, in God’s great grace, so good, my heart still smote me for the severity with which I had spoken the truth to her; and it was a relief to myself to endeavour to make some amends for having so spoken to her.  But I had no intention of going near her that night, for I thought the less she saw of me the better, till she should be a little stronger, and have had time, with the help of her renewed feelings, to get over the painful associations so long accompanying the thought of me.  So I took my place beside Gerard, and watched through the night.  The little fellow repeatedly cried out in that terror which is so often the consequence of the loss of blood; but when I laid my hand on him, he smiled without waking, and lay quite still again for a while.  Once or twice he woke up, and looked so bewildered that I feared delirium; but a little jelly composed him, and he fell fast asleep again.  He did not seem even to have headache from the blow.

But when I was left alone with the child, seated in a chair by the fire, my only light, how my thoughts rushed upon the facts bearing on my own history which this day had brought before me!  Horror it was to think of Miss Oldcastle even as only riding with the seducer of Catherine Weir.  There was torture in the thought of his touching her hand; and to think that before the summer came once more, he might be her husband!  I will not dwell on the sufferings of that night more than is needful; for even now, in my old age, I cannot recall without renewing them.  But I must indicate one train of thought which kept passing through my mind with constant recurrence:—­Was it fair to let her marry such a man in ignorance?  Would she marry him if she knew what I knew of him?  Could I speak against my rival?—­blacken him even with the truth—­the only defilement that can really cling?  Could I for my own dignity do so?  And was she therefore to be sacrificed in ignorance?  Might not some one else do it instead of me?  But if I set it agoing, was it not precisely the same thing as if I did it myself, only more cowardly?