All Chapters of Wives and Daughters: Chapter 51 - Chapter 60

Molly had her out-of-door things on, and she crept away as she was bidden. She lifted her heavy weight of heart and body along till she came to a field, not so very far off,—where she had sought the comfort of loneliness ever since she was a child; and there, under the hedge-bank, she sate down, burying her face in her hands, and quivering all over as she thought of Cynthia's misery, which she might not try to touch or assuage. She never knew how long she sate there, but it was long past lunch-time when once again she stole up to her room. The door opposite was open wide,—Cynthia had quitted the chamber. Molly arranged her dress and went down into the drawing-room. Cynthia and her mother sate there in the stern repose of an armed neutrality. Cynthia's face looked made of stone, for colour and rigidity; but she was netting away as if nothing unusual had occurred. Not so Mrs. Gibson; her face bore evident marks of tears, and she looked up and greeted Molly's entrance with a faint smiling

Robinson opened the door for Molly almost before the carriage had fairly drawn up at the Hall, and told her that the Squire had been very anxious for her return, and had more than once sent him to an upstairs window, from which a glimpse of the hill-road between Hollingford and Hamley could be caught, to know if the carriage was not yet in sight. Molly went into the drawing-room. The Squire was standing in the middle of the floor awaiting her—in fact, longing to go out and meet her, but restrained by a feeling of solemn etiquette, which prevented his moving about as usual in that house of mourning. He held a paper in his hands, which were trembling with excitement and emotion; and four or five open letters were strewed on a table near him."It's all true," he began; "she's his wife, and he's her husband—was her husband—that's the word for it—was! Poor lad! poor lad! it's cost him a deal. Pray God, it wasn't my fault. Read this, my dear. It's a certificate. It's all regular—Osborne Ham

And now it was late June; and to Molly's and her father's extreme urgency in pushing, and Mr. and Mrs. Kirkpatrick's affectionate persistency in pulling, Cynthia had yielded, and had gone back to finish her interrupted visit in London, but not before the bruit of her previous sudden return to nurse Molly had told strongly in her favour in the fluctuating opinion of the little town. Her affair with Mr. Preston was thrust into the shade; while every one was speaking of her warm heart. Under the gleam of Molly's recovery everything assumed a rosy hue, as indeed became the time when actual roses were fully in bloom.One morning Mrs. Gibson brought Molly a great basket of flowers, that had been sent from the Hall. Molly still breakfasted in bed, but she had just come down, and was now well enough to arrange the flowers for the drawing-room, and as she did so with these blossoms, she made some comments on each."Ah! these white pinks! They were Mrs. Hamley's favourite flower; and so like h

The whole town of Hollingford came to congratulate and inquire into particulars. Some indeed—Mrs. Goodenough at the head of this class of malcontents—thought that they were defrauded of their right to a fine show by Cynthia's being married in London. Even Lady Cumnor was moved into action. She, who had hardly ever paid calls "out of her own sphere," who had only once been to see "Clare" in her own house—she came to congratulate after her fashion. Maria had only just time to run up into the drawing-room one morning, and say,—"Please, ma'am, the great carriage from the Towers is coming up to the gate, and my lady the Countess is sitting inside." It was but eleven o'clock, and Mrs. Gibson would have been indignant at any commoner who had ventured to call at such an untimely hour, but in the case of the Peerage the rules of domestic morality were relaxed.The family "stood at arms," as it were, till Lady Cumnor appeared in the drawing-room; and then she had to be settled in the best cha

The conversation ended there for the time. Wedding-cake and wine were brought in, and it was Molly's duty to serve them out. But those last words of Mrs. Goodenough's tingled in her ears, and she tried to interpret them to her own satisfaction in any way but the obvious one. And that, too, was destined to be confirmed; for directly after Mrs. Goodenough took her leave, Mrs. Gibson desired Molly to carry away the tray to a table close to an open corner window, where the things might be placed in readiness for any future callers; and underneath this open window went the path from the house-door to the road. Molly heard Mrs. Goodenough saying to her grand-daughter,—"That Mrs. Gibson is a deep 'un. There's Mr. Roger Hamley as like as not to have the Hall estate, and she sends Molly a-visiting—" and then she passed out of hearing. Molly could have burst out crying, with a full sudden conviction of what Mrs. Goodenough had been alluding to: her sense of the impropriety of Molly's going to