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He little knew how his daughter's heart was burning within her. He never dreamed that she, too, was suffering torn by conflicting emotions. It was a sore thing to find that in her benefactress lived an unsuspected rival. Just before sunset she had left him and gone to her room to change her dress for the evening, and Janet's first swoop was upon her brother.
She, too, took Janet's hand. "Have you come to help us?" she asked. And Janet said: "Oh, I'd like to, but I have other work." "Come in and see us again," said Insall, and Janet, promising, took her leave.... "Who is she, Brooks?" Mrs. Maturin asked, when Janet had gone. "Well," he answered, "I don't know. What does it matter?" Mrs. Maturin smiled. "I should say that it did matter," she replied.
Sam did not understand Janet's point of view. It was all too new and foreign to everything life had taught him, and in his mind he fought her ideas doggedly, clinging to his own concrete, practical thoughts and hopes, but on the train homeward bound, and in his own room later, he turned over and over in his mind the things she had said and tried in a dim way to grasp the bigness of the conception of human life she had got sitting in a wheel chair and looking down into Wabash Avenue.
It was almost with regret that they espied land; for Janet was anxious, and Katherine was apprehensive of the Scot, and as the white cliffs appeared to rise higher they each wished the sea journey had just begun. At last they stood upon English soil, and so bewildered was Katherine she could only cling to Janet's dress like a frightened child; there was such a clamour, 'twas like pandemonium.
She is not knee-deep in engagements, as you are, my dear, and that precious son of mine; so we are going to amuse each other, and see how much entertainment we can squeeze out of the countryside!" "But I haven't I didn't I'm not sure," stammered Claire, acutely conscious of the hardening of Janet's face, but once again Mrs Fanshawe waved aside her objections. "But I am sure!
"'And I saw a new heaven, and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away and there was no more sea." Janet's voice repeated the words slowly, tenderly. Their beauty held her fancy. "Davy explains that" Susan's muffled words came dully "this way. He says the old happy time, when William Henry an' me was young an' lovin', you know about that?" "Yes, Susan Jane."
On common occasions the bairns would not have let Janet's silence pass unheeded, but to-night they were busy discussing matters of importance, and except to say now and then, "Whist, bairns! your father will be here!" she sat without a word. There was a hush at last, as a step was heard descending the stairs, and in a minute their father entered. It was not fear that quieted them.
She had no personal agitations about the day's post; but she did feel interested in the thought of those parcels from Switzerland which lay awaiting Janet Willoughby's return. Half eager, half shrinking, she looked forward to seeing their contents. It was in Janet's dainty boudoir that the unpacking took place.
Turn back the century a few decades, and we are together on a moonlight night, taking a short cut through the fields from the farm of Craigiebuckle. Buxom were Craigiebuckle's "dochters," and Jamie was Janet's accepted suitor. It was a muddy road through damp grass, and we picked our way silently over its ruts and pools.
You have abandoned your marriage engagement; you have forfeited Lady Janet's love; you have ruined all your worldly prospects; you are now returning, self-devoted, to a life which you have yourself described as a life without hope. And all this you have done of your own free-will at a time when you are absolutely secure of your position in the house for the sake of speaking the truth.
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