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031 - Ch 31 - 'Should Auld Acquaintance Be Forgot' · North and South (version 2)

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  Speaker 1: Chapter thirty one of North and South Elizabeth Gaskell. This
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  Speaker 1: LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Read by Marianne
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  Speaker 1: Chapter thirty one. Should old acquaintance be forgot? Show not
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  Speaker 1: that manner and these features all the serpent's cunning and
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  Speaker 1: the sinners fall crap. The chill, shivery October morning came.
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  Speaker 1: Not the October morning of the country, with soft silvery
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  Speaker 1: mists clearing off before the sunbeams that bring out all
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  Speaker 1: the gorgeous beauty of coloring, but the October morning of Milton,
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  Speaker 1: whose silvery mists were heavy fogs, and where the sun
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  Speaker 1: could only show long, dusky streets when he did break
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  Speaker 1: through and shine. Margaret went languidly about assisting Dixon in
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  Speaker 1: her task of arranging the house. Her eyes were continually
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  Speaker 1: blinded by tears, but she had no time to give
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  Speaker 1: way to regular crying. The father and brother depended upon her.
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  Speaker 1: While they were giving way to grief. She must be working, planning, considering.
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  Speaker 1: Even the necessary arrangements for the funeral seemed to devolve
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  Speaker 1: upon her. When the fire was bright and crackling, when
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  Speaker 1: everything was ready for breakfast and the tea kettle was
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  Speaker 1: singing away, Margaret gave a last look around the room
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  Speaker 1: before going to summon mister Hale and Frederick. She wanted
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  Speaker 1: everything to look as cheerful as possible, and yet when
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  Speaker 1: it did so, the contrast between it and her own
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  Speaker 1: thoughts forced her into sudden weeping. She was kneeling by
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  Speaker 1: the sofa, hiding her face in the cushions that no
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  Speaker 1: one might hear her cry, when she was touched on
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  Speaker 1: the shoulder by Dixon. Come, miss Hale, Come, my dear.
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  Speaker 1: You must not give way, or where shall we all be?
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  Speaker 1: There's not another person in the house fit to give
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  Speaker 1: a direction of any kind, and there is so much
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  Speaker 1: to be done. There's who to manage the funeral, and
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  Speaker 1: who's to come to it, and where it's to be,
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  Speaker 1: and all to be settled. And Master Frederick's like one
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  Speaker 1: crazed with crying, and Master never was a good one
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  Speaker 1: for settling. And poor gentleman he goes about now as
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  Speaker 1: if he was lost. It's bad enough, my dear, I know,
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  Speaker 1: but death comes to us all, and you're well off
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  Speaker 1: never to have lost any friend till now. Perhaps so,
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  Speaker 1: But this seemed a loss by itself, not to bear
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  Speaker 1: comparison with any other event in the world. Margaret did
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  Speaker 1: not take any comfort from what Dixon said, but the
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  Speaker 1: unusual tenderness of the prim old servant's manner touched her
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  Speaker 1: to the heart, and more from a desire to show
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  Speaker 1: her gratitude for this than for any other reason. She
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  Speaker 1: roused herself up and smiled in answer to Dixon's anxious
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  Speaker 1: look at her, and went to tell her father and
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  Speaker 1: brother that breakfast was ready. Mister Hale came as if
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  Speaker 1: in a dream, or rather with the unconscious motion of
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  Speaker 1: a sleep walker whose eyes and mind perceive other things
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  Speaker 1: than what are present. Frederick came briskly in with a
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  Speaker 1: forced cheerfulness, grasped her hand, looked into her eyes, and
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  Speaker 1: burst into tears. She had to try and think of
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  Speaker 1: little nothings to say all breakfast time, in order to
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  Speaker 1: prevent the recurrence of her companion's thoughts too strongly to
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  Speaker 1: the last meal they had taken together, when there had
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  Speaker 1: been a continual, strained listening for some sound or signal
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  Speaker 1: from the sick room. After breakfast, she resolved to speak
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  Speaker 1: to her father about the funeral. He shook his head
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  Speaker 1: and assented to all she proposed, though many of her
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  Speaker 1: propositions absolutely contradicted one another. Margaret gained no real decision
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  Speaker 1: from him, and was leaving the room languidly to have
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  Speaker 1: a consultation with Dixon when mister Hale motioned her back
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  Speaker 1: to his side. Ask mister Bell, he said, in a
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  Speaker 1: hollow voice. Mister Bell, said she a little surprise, mister
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  Speaker 1: Bell of Oxford. Mister Bell, he repeated, Yes, he was
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  Speaker 1: my groomsman. Margaret understood the association. I will write to day,
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  Speaker 1: said she. He sank again into listlessness. All morning, she
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  Speaker 1: toiled on, longing for rest, but in a continual whirl
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  Speaker 1: of melancholy business. Towards evening, Dixon said to her, I've
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  Speaker 1: done it. Miss I was really afraid for Master that
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  Speaker 1: he'd have a stroke with grief. He's been all this
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  Speaker 1: day with poor missus, and when I've listened at the door,
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  Speaker 1: I've heard him talking to her and talking to her
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  Speaker 1: as if she was alive. When I went in, he
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  Speaker 1: would be quiet, but all in a maze like so
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  Speaker 1: I thought to myself, he ought to be roused, and
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  Speaker 1: if it gives him a shock at first, it will
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  Speaker 1: maybe be better afterwards. So I've been and told him
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  Speaker 1: that I don't think it's safe for Master Frederick to
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  Speaker 1: be here, and I don't. It was only on Tuesday,
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  Speaker 1: when I was out that I met a Southampton man,
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  Speaker 1: the first I've seen since I came to Milton. They
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  Speaker 1: don't make their way much up here, I think. Well,
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  Speaker 1: it was young Leonard's Old Leonards, the draper's son, as
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  Speaker 1: great a scamp as ever lived, who plagued his father
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  Speaker 1: almost to death and then ran off to sea. I
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  Speaker 1: never could abide him. He was on the Orion at
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  Speaker 1: the same time as Master Frederick, I know, though I
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  Speaker 1: don't recollect if he was there at the mutiny? Did
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  Speaker 1: he know you, said Margaret eagerly. Why, that's the worst
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  Speaker 1: of it. I don't believe he would have known me
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  Speaker 1: but for my being such a fool as to call
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  Speaker 1: out his name he were a Southampton man in a
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  Speaker 1: strange place, or else I should never have been so
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  Speaker 1: ready to call cousins with him. A nasty, good for
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  Speaker 1: nothing fellow says he, miss Dixon, who would have thought
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  Speaker 1: of seeing you here? But perhaps I mistake, and you're
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  Speaker 1: miss Dixon no longer. So I told him he might
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  Speaker 1: still address me as an unmarried lady, though if I
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  Speaker 1: hadn't been so particular I guess I'd good chances of matrimony.
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  Speaker 1: He was polite enough, he couldn't look at me and
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  Speaker 1: doubt me. But I were not to be caught with
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  Speaker 1: some chaff from such a fellow as him, And so
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  Speaker 1: I told him. And by way of being even, I
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  Speaker 1: asked him after his father, who I knew had turned
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  Speaker 1: him out of doors, as if they were the best
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  Speaker 1: friends as ever was so then to spite me, for
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  Speaker 1: you see, we were getting savage for all we were
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  Speaker 1: so civil to each other. He began to inquire after
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  Speaker 1: Master Frederick and said what a scrape he'd got into,
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  Speaker 1: as if Master Frederick's scrapes would ever wash George Leonard's
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  Speaker 1: white or make him look otherwise than nasty, dirty black,
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  Speaker 1: And how he'd be hung for mutiny if ever he
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  Speaker 1: were caught, and how a hundred pound reward had been
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  Speaker 1: offered for catching him, and what a disgrace he had
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  Speaker 1: been to his family, all to spite me, you see,
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  Speaker 1: my dear, because before now I've helped old mister Leonards
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  Speaker 1: to give George a good rating down in Southampton. So
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  Speaker 1: I said there were other families to be thankful if
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  Speaker 1: they could think they were earning an honest living as
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  Speaker 1: I knew, who had far more cause to blush for
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  Speaker 1: their sons and to far away from home, to which
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  Speaker 1: he made answer like the impudent chap he is that
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  Speaker 1: he were in a confidential situation. And if I knew
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  Speaker 1: of any young man who had been so unfortunate as
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  Speaker 1: to lead vicious courses and wanted to turn steady, he'd
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  Speaker 1: have no objection to lend him his patronage. He indeed,
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  Speaker 1: why he'd corrupt a saint. I've not felt so bad
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  Speaker 1: myself for years as when I were standing talking to
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  Speaker 1: him the other day. I could have cried to think
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  Speaker 1: I couldn't spite him better, for he kept smiling in
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  Speaker 1: my face, as if he took all my compliments for earnest.
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  Speaker 1: And I couldn't see that he minded what I said
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  Speaker 1: in the least while I was mad with all his speeches.
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  Speaker 1: But you did not tell him anything about us, about Frederick, not,
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  Speaker 1: I said Dixon. He never had the grace to ask
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  Speaker 1: where I was staying, and I shouldn't have told him
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  Speaker 1: if he had asked, Nor did I ask him what
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  Speaker 1: his precious situation was. He was waiting for a bus,
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  Speaker 1: and just then it drove up and he hailed it,
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  Speaker 1: but to plague me to the last. He turned back
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  Speaker 1: before he got in and said, if you can help
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  Speaker 1: me to trap Lieutenant Hale, Miss Dixon, we'll go partners
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  Speaker 1: in the reward. I know you'd be my partner, now,
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  Speaker 1: wouldn't you? Don't be shy but say yes. And he
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  Speaker 1: jumped on the bus, and I saw his ugly face
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  Speaker 1: leering at me with a wicked smile. To think how
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  Speaker 1: he'd had the last word of plaguing. Margaret was made
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  Speaker 1: very uncomfortable by this account of Dixon's Have you told
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  Speaker 1: Frederick asked? She no, said Dixon. I were uneasy in
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  Speaker 1: my mind at knowing that bad Leonards was in town,
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  Speaker 1: but there was so much else to think about that
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  Speaker 1: I did not dwell on it at all. But when
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  Speaker 1: I saw Master sitting so stiff and with his eyes
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  Speaker 1: so glazed and sad, I thought it might rouse him
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  Speaker 1: to have to think of Master Frederick's safety a bit,
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  Speaker 1: so I told him all though I blushed to say,
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  Speaker 1: how a young man had been speaking to me, and
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  Speaker 1: it has done Master good. And if we're to keep
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  Speaker 1: Master Frederick in hiding, he would have to go. Poor fellow.
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  Speaker 1: Before mister Bell came, Oh, I'm not afraid of mister Bell,
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  Speaker 1: but I am afraid of this Leonards. We must tell Frederick,
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  Speaker 1: what did Leonards look like? A bad looking fellow. I
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  Speaker 1: can assure you, miss whiskers such as I should be
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  Speaker 1: ashamed to wear. They are so red. And for all
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  Speaker 1: he said he'd got a confidential situation, he was dressed
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  Speaker 1: in a fustian just like a working man. It was
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  Speaker 1: evident that Frederick must go, go too. When he had
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  Speaker 1: so completely vaulted into his place in the family and
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  Speaker 1: promised to be such a stay and staff to his
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  Speaker 1: father and sister, go when his cares for the living
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  Speaker 1: mother and sorrow for the dead seemed to make him
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  Speaker 1: one of those peculiar people who are bound to us
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  Speaker 1: by a fellow love for them that are taken away.
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  Speaker 1: Just as Margaret was thinking all this, sitting over the
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  Speaker 1: drawing room fire, her father, restless and uneasy under the
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  Speaker 1: pressure of this newly aroused fear of which he had
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  Speaker 1: not as yet spoken, Frederick came in, his brightness dimmed,
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  Speaker 1: but the extreme violence of his grief passed away. He
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  Speaker 1: came up to Margaret and kissed her forehead. How wan
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  Speaker 1: you look, Margaret? He said in a low voice. You
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  Speaker 1: have been thinking of everybody, and no one has thought
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  Speaker 1: of you. Lie on this sofa. There is nothing for
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  Speaker 1: you to do. That is the worst, said Margaret in
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  Speaker 1: a sad whisper. But she went and lay down, and
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  Speaker 1: her brother covered her feet with a shawl, and then
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  Speaker 1: sat on the ground by her side, and the two
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  Speaker 1: began to talk in a subdued tone. Margaret told him
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  Speaker 1: all that Dixon had related of her interview with young Leonard's.
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  Speaker 1: Frederick's lips closed with a long whew of des I
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  Speaker 1: should just like to have it out with that young fellow.
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  Speaker 1: A worse sailor was never on board ship, nor much
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  Speaker 1: a worse man either, I declare, Margaret. You know the
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  Speaker 1: circumstances of the whole affair. Yes, Mamma told me, well,
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  Speaker 1: when all the sailors who were good for anything were
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  Speaker 1: indignant with our captain, this fellow to curry favor pah,
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  Speaker 1: and to think of his being here. Oh, if he'd
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  Speaker 1: a notion I was within twenty miles of him, he'd
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  Speaker 1: fared me out to pay off old grudges. I'd rather
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  Speaker 1: anybody had the hundred pounds they think I am worth
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  Speaker 1: than that Rascal. What a pity poor old Dixon could
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  Speaker 1: not be persuaded to give me up and make a
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  Speaker 1: provision for her old age. Oh, Frederick, hush, don't talk.
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  Speaker 1: So mister Hale came towards them, eager and trembling. He
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  Speaker 1: had overheard what they were saying. He took Frederick's hand
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  Speaker 1: in both of his. My boy, you must go. It
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  Speaker 1: is very bad, but I see you must. You have
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  Speaker 1: done all you could. You have been a comfort to her. Oh, Papa,
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  Speaker 1: must he go, said Margaret, pleading against her own conviction
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  Speaker 1: of necessity. I declare, I've a good mind to face
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  Speaker 1: it out and stand my trial. If I could only
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  Speaker 1: pick up my evidence. I can't endure the thought of
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  Speaker 1: being in the power of such a blackguard as Leonards
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  Speaker 1: I could almost have enjoyed in other circumstances. This stolen visit.
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  Speaker 1: It has had all the charm which the French woman
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  Speaker 1: attribute to forbidden pleasures. One of the earliest things I
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  Speaker 1: can remember, said Margaret, was your being in some great
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  Speaker 1: disgrace fred for stealing apples. We had plenty of our
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  Speaker 1: own trees loaded with them. But some one had told
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  Speaker 1: you that stolen fruit tasted sweetest, which you took a
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  Speaker 1: pete de la lettre and went off a robbing. You
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  Speaker 1: have not changed feelings much since then. Yes, you must go,
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  Speaker 1: repeated mister Hale, answering Margaret's question, which she had asked
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  Speaker 1: some time ago. His thoughts were fixed on one subject,
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  Speaker 1: and it was an effort for him to follow the
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  Speaker 1: zigzag remarks of his children, an effort which he did
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  Speaker 1: not make. Margaret and Frederick looked at each other that
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  Speaker 1: quick momentary sympathy would be theirs no longer if he
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  Speaker 1: went away. So much was understood through eyes that could
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  Speaker 1: not be put into words. Both coursed the same thought
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  Speaker 1: till it was lost in sadness. Frederick shook it off first.
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  Speaker 1: Do you know, Margaret, I was very nearly giving both
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  Speaker 1: Dixon and myself a good fright this afternoon, I was
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  Speaker 1: in my bedroom. I had heard a ring at the
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  Speaker 1: front door, but I thought the ringer must have done
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  Speaker 1: his business and gone away long ago. So I was
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  Speaker 1: on the point of making my appearance in the passage
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  Speaker 1: when as I opened my room door, I saw Dixon
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  Speaker 1: coming downstairs, and she and kicked me into hiding again.
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  Speaker 1: I kept the door open and heard a message given
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  Speaker 1: to some man that was in my father's study, and
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  Speaker 1: that then went away. Who could it have been some
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  Speaker 1: of the shopmen? Very likely, said Margaret indifferently. There was
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  Speaker 1: a little quiet man who came up for orders about
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  Speaker 1: two o'clock. But this was not a little man, a
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  Speaker 1: great powerful fellow, and it was past four when he
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  Speaker 1: was here. It was mister Thornton, said mister Hale. They
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: were glad to have drawn him into the conversation. Mister Thornton,
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: said Margaret, a little surprised. I thought, well, little one,
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  Speaker 1: what did you think, asked Frederick, as she did not
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  Speaker 1: finish her sentence. Oh, only, said she, reddening and looking
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  Speaker 1: straight at him. I fancied you meant some one of
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  Speaker 1: a different class, not a gentleman, somebody come on an
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: errand he looked like one of that kind, said Frederick carelessly.
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  Speaker 1: I took him for a shopman, and he turns out
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  Speaker 1: a manufacturer. Margaret was silent. She remembered how at first,
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  Speaker 1: before she knew his character, she had spoken and thought
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  Speaker 1: of him just as Frederick was doing. It was but
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  Speaker 1: a natural impression that was made upon him, and yet
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  Speaker 1: she was a little annoyed by it. She was unwilling
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  Speaker 1: to speak. She wanted to make Frederick understand what kind
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  Speaker 1: of person mister Thornton was, but she was tongue tied.
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  Speaker 1: Mister Hale went on. He came to offer any assistance
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  Speaker 1: in his power, I believe, but I could not see him.
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  Speaker 1: I told Dixon to ask him if he would like
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  Speaker 1: to see you. I think I asked her to find
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  Speaker 1: you and you would go to him. I don't know
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  Speaker 1: what I said. He has been a very agreeable acquaintance,
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  Speaker 1: has he not, asked Frederick, throwing the question like a
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  Speaker 1: ball for any one to catch. Who chose a very
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  Speaker 1: kind friend? Said Margaret. When her father did not answer,
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  Speaker 1: Frederick was silent for a time. At last, he spoke, Margaret,
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  Speaker 1: it is painful to think I can never thank those
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  Speaker 1: who have shown you kindness. Your acquaintances and mine must
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  Speaker 1: be separate, unless, indeed, I run the chances of a
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: court martial, or unless you and my father would come
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: to Spain. He threw out this last suggestion as a
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  Speaker 1: kind of feeler, and then suddenly made the plunge. You
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: don't know how I wish you would. I have a
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  Speaker 1: good position, the chance of a better continued he, reddening,
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  Speaker 1: like a girl that Dolores Barber that I was telling
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: you of Margaret. I only wish you knew her. I
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: am sure you would like. No, love is the right word.
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  Speaker 1: Like is so poor? You would love her father if
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: you knew her. She is not eighteen, but if she
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: is in the same mind another year, she is to
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: be my wife. Mister Barber. Won't let us call it
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: an engagement. But if you would come, you would find
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: friends everywhere. Besides, still, Lord, think of it. Father, Margaret,
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  Speaker 1: be on my side. No, no more removals for me,
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: said mister Hale. One removal has cost me my wife.
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  Speaker 1: No more removals in this life. She will be here
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  Speaker 1: and I will stay out my appointed time. Oh, Frederick,
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: said Margaret. Tell us more about her. I never thought
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  Speaker 1: of this, but I am so glad you will have
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  Speaker 1: some one to love and care for you out there.
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: Tell us all about it. In the first place, she
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: is a Roman Catholic. That's the only objection I anticipated.
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  Speaker 1: But my father's change of opinion. Nay, Margaret, don't sigh.
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: Margaret had reason to sigh a little more before the
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  Speaker 1: conversation ended. Frederick himself was Roman Catholic in fact, though
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: not in profession. As yet. This was then the reason
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: why his sympathy in her extreme distress at her father's
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: leaving the church, had been so faintly expressed in his letters.
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  Speaker 1: She had thought it was the carelessness of a sailor.
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: But the truth was that even then he was himself
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  Speaker 1: inclined to give up the form of religion into which
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: he had been baptized, only that his opinions were tending
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  Speaker 1: in exactly the opposite direction to those of his father.
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  Speaker 1: How much love had to do with this change, not
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: even Frederick himself could have told. Margaret gave up talking
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: about this branch of the subject at last, and returning
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  Speaker 1: to the fact of the engagement, she began to consider
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: it in some fresh light. But for her sake, fred
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: you surely will try and clear yourself of the exaggerated
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: charges brought against you, even if the charge of mutiny
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: itself be true. If there were to be a court
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: martial and you could find your witnesses, you might at
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: any rate show how your disobedience to authority was because
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: that authority was unworthily exercised. Mister Hale roused himself up
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: to listen to his son's answer. In the first place, Margaret,
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  Speaker 1: who is to hunt up my witnesses. All of them
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: are sailors drafted off to other ships, except those whose
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: evidence would go for very little, as they took part
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: or sympathized in the affair. In the next place, allow
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: me to tell you don't know what a court martial is,
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: and consider it an assembly where justice is administered instead
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: of what it really is, a court where authority weighs
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: nine tenths in the balance and evidence forms only the
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: other tenth. In such cases, evidence itself can hardly escape
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: being influenced by the prestige of authority. But is it
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: not worth trying to see how much evidence might be
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: discovered and arrayed on your behalf? At present? All those
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: who knew you formerly believe you guilty without any shadow
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: of excuse. You have never tried to justify yourself, and
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: we have never known where to seek for proofs of
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: your justification. Now, for Miss Barbour's sake, make your conduct
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: as clear as you can in the eye of the world.
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: She may not care for it. She has, I am
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: sure that trust in you that we all have. But
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: you ought not to let her ally herself to one
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: under such a serious charge without showing the world exactly
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: how it is you stand. You disobeyed authority that was bad,
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: but to have stood by without a word or act
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: while the authority was brutally used would have been infinitely worse.
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: People know what you did, but not the motives that
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: elevate it out of a crime into a heroic protection
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: of the weak. For Dolores's sake, they ought to know.
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: But how must I make them know. I am not
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: sufficiently sure of the purity and justice of those who
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: would be my judges to give myself up to a
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: court martial. Even if I could bring a whole array
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: of truth speaking witnesses, I can't send a bellman about
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: to cry aloud and proclaim in the streets what you
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: are pleased to call my heroism. No one would read
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: a pamphlet of justification so long after the deed, even
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: if I put one out. Will you consult a lawyer
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: as to your chances of exculpation, asked Margaret, looking up
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: and turning very red. I must first catch my lawyer
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: and have a look at him and see how I
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: like him before I make him into my confidante. Many
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: a briefless barrister might twist his conscience into thinking that
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: he could earn a hundred pounds very easily by doing
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: a good action in giving me a criminal up to justice. Nonsense, Frederick,
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: because I know a lawyer on whose honor I can
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: rely of whose cleverness in his profession people speak very highly.
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: And who would I think take a good deal of
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: trouble for any of of Aunt Shaw's relations, mister Henry Lennox. Papa,
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: I think it is a good idea, said mister Hale.
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: But don't propose anything which will detain Frederick in England.
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: Don't for your mother's sake. You could go to London
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: to morrow evening by a night train, continued Margaret, warming
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: up into her plan. He must go to morrow. I'm afraid, Papa,
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: said she tenderly. We fixed that because of mister Bell
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: and Dixon's disagreeable acquaintance. Yes, I must go tomorrow, said
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: Frederick decidedly. Mister Hale groaned, I can't bear to part
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: with you, and yet I am miserable with anxiety. As
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: long as you stop here, well, then, said Margaret, listen
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: to my plan. He gets to London on Friday morning,
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: I will you might No, it would be better for
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: me to give him a note to mister Lennox. You
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: will find him at his chambers in the Temple. I
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: will write down a list of all the names I
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: can remember on board the Orion. I could leave it
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: with him to ferret them out. He is Edith's husband's brother,
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: isn't he? I remember your naming him in your letter.
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: I have money in barber's hands. I can pay a
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: pretty long bill if there is any chance of success. Money,
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: dear father that I had meant for a different purpose,
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: so I shall only consider it as borrowed from you
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: and Margaret. Don't do that, said Margaret. You won't risk
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: it if you do, and it will be a risk
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: only if it's worth trying. You can sail from London
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: as well as from Liverpool, to be sure, little goose.
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: Wherever I feel water heaving under a plank, there I
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: feel at home. I'll pick up some craft or other
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: to take me off. Never fear, I won't stay twenty
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: four hours in London away from you on the one hand,
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: and from somebody else on the other. It was rather
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: a comfort to Margaret that Frederick took it in his
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: head to look over her shoulder as she wrote to
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: mister Lennox. If she had not been thus compelled to
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: write steadily and concisely on she might have hesitated over
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: many a word and been puzzled to choose between many
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: an expression in the awkwardness of being the first to
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: resume the intercourse of which the concluding event had been
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: so unpleasant to both sides. However, the note was taken
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: from her before she even had time to look it over,
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: and treasured up in a pocket book, out of which
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: fell a long lock of black hair, the sight of
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: which caused Frederick's eyes to glow with pleasure. Now you
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: would like to see that, wouldn't you, said he No,
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: you must wait till you see her herself. She is
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: too perfect to be known by fragments. No mean brick
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: shall be a specimen of the building of my palace.
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: End of Chapter thirty one.