To the end of
his days he never suspected that to have been less the lover and more the
clear-sighted outspoken friend would have been better for her and for
him. He sat into the night smoking pipe after pipe, grappling with a
situation which would have presented no difficulties to a coarser nature.
At last he went upstairs, listened a moment at Ann's chamber door, and
having smoked too much spent a thought-tormented night, out of which he
won one conclusion--the need to discuss his trouble with some friend. At
six he rose and dressed, asked the astonished cook for an egg and coffee,
went to the stables, and ordered a groom to saddle horses and follow him.
A wild gallop over perilously slippery roads brought him to McGregor's
door, a quarter of a mile from the mills. The doctor was at breakfast,
and rose up astonished. "What's wrong now, Penhallow?" he said.
"Oh, everything--everything."
"Then sit down and let us talk. What is it?"
The Squire took himself in hand and quietly related his story of the
contract and his wife's reception of what had been to him so agreeable
until she had spoken.
"Can you bear--I said it yesterday to Mrs. Penhallow--a frank opinion?"
"Yes, from you--anything."
"Have no alarm about her health, my friend. It is only the hysteria of a
woman a little spoiled by too tender indulgence.
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