Margaret smiled at her ardour, but never was impatient or seemed to tire of discussing the little details so dear to the prospective young housekeeper, or of making visits with her to the new home and guiding her somewhat abrupt taste.
As Andrea worked with a will, her enthusiasm infected Waldsen, and he believed himself happy again, until he discovered, as he usually did, that some arrangement which particularly delighted him was a happy thought of Margaret’s.
At this time Margaret was often away from home. After her visit to Mrs. Watson, one of her old schoolmates, who had recently married and settled in Bridgeton, begged her to come there for a visit; and she felt also that she must have change, so she promised to stay two weeks with her friend.
“Send for me if you need me for anything, no matter how trifling,” she said, when she left home.
Margaret had been at Bridgeton about ten days. It was a rainy evening, and she was sitting by the open fire with her friends, talking about school-days.
The dog, who had been sleeping on the hearth-rug, started suddenly, and, after cocking his ears in a listening attitude, rushed to the door, barking violently. Horses’ hoofs sounded on the road with the peculiar sucking thud that rain and mud lend; the gate banged to, and hurried footsteps crossed the piazza. Margaret, without knowing why, went quickly to the door and opened it before her friends comprehended what she was doing, or before any one knocked.
On the threshold, lantern in hand, stood Ezra Tolford. Water was streaming from the limp brim of his felt hat and ran down his rubber coat in little streams.
“I knew it was some one from home! What is it, father?” Margaret cried.
The Deacon had a white, scared look and moistened his lips with his tongue twice before he answered—“Waldsen is very sick; the doctor says it’s pneumonia. A lot of neighbours have come in and upset things under pretext of helping Andrea. Doctor Russell says we must have a nurse if he lasts through to-night, and I thought you’d want to know!”
Margaret did not hear the last words; she was already upstairs and back again, buttoning her thick coat as she came. Her friends protested against her going out on such a night, her father joining them, but not insistently. He seemed ill at ease, as if he had some secret on his mind.