'Why, lad! I'm a'most ashamed to tell thee, I were sore put out
mysel'; but Sylvia were so broken-hearted like I couldn't cast it up
to her as I should ha' liked: th' silly lass had gone and gi'en him
a bit o' ribbon, as many a one knowed, for it had been a vast
noticed and admired that evenin' at th' Corneys'--new year's eve I
think it were--and t' poor vain peacock had tied it on his hat, so
that when t' tide----hist! there's Sylvie coming in at t' back-door;
never let on,' and in a forced made-up voice she inquired aloud, for
hitherto she had been speaking almost in a whisper,-'And didst ta see King George an' Queen Charlotte?' Philip could not answer--did not hear. His soul had gone out to meet
Sylvia, who entered with quiet slowness quite unlike her former
self. Her face was wan and white; her gray eyes seemed larger, and
full of dumb tearless sorrow; she came up to Philip, as if his being
there touched her with no surprise, and gave him a gentle greeting
as if he were a familiar indifferent person whom she had seen but
yesterday. Philip, who had recollected the quarrel they had had, and
about Kinraid too, the very last time they had met, had expected
some trace of this remembrance to linger in her looks and speech to
him. But there was no such sign; her great sorrow had wiped away all
anger, almost all memory. Her mother looked at her anxiously, and
then said in the same manner of forced cheerfulness which she had
used before,-'Here's Philip, lass, a' full o' Lunnon; call thy father in, an
we'll hear a' about t' new-fangled pleughs. It'll be rare an' nice
a' sitting together again.' Sylvia, silent and docile, went out to the shippen to obey her
mother's wish. Bell Robson leant forward towards Philip,
misinterpreting the expression on his face, which was guilt as much
as sympathy, and checked the possible repentance which might have
urged him on at that moment to tell all he knew, by saying, 'Lad!
it's a' for t' best. He were noane good enough for her; and I
misdoubt me he were only playin' wi' her as he'd done by others. Let
her a-be, let her a-be; she'll come round to be thankful.' Robson bustled in with loud welcome; all the louder and more
talkative because he, like his wife, assumed a cheerful manner
before Sylvia. Yet he, unlike his wife, had many a secret regret
over Kinraid's fate. At first, while merely the fact of his
disappearance was known, Daniel Robson had hit on the truth, and had
stuck to his opinion that the cursed press-gang were at the bottom
of it. He had backed his words by many an oath, and all the more
because he had not a single reason to give that applied to the
present occasion. No one on the lonely coast had remarked any sign
of the presence of the men-of-war, or the tenders that accompanied
them, for the purpose of impressment on the king's ships. At
Shields, and at the mouth of the Tyne, where they lay in greedy
wait, the owners of the Urania had caused strict search to be made
for their skilled and protected specksioneer, but with no success.
All this positive evidence in contradiction to Daniel Robson's
opinion only made him cling to it the more; until the day when the
hat was found on the shore with Kinraid's name written out large and
fair in the inside, and the tell-tale bit of ribbon knotted in the
band. Then Daniel, by a sudden revulsion, gave up every hope; it
never entered his mind that it could have fallen off by any
accident. No! now Kinraid was dead and drowned, and it was a bad
job, and the sooner it could be forgotten the better for all
parties; and it was well no one knew how far it had gone with
Sylvia, especially now since Bessy Corney was crying her eyes out as
if he had been engaged to her. So Daniel said nothing to his wife
about the mischief that had gone on in her absence, and never spoke
to Sylvia about the affair; only he was more than usually tender to
her in his rough way, and thought, morning, noon, and night, on what
he could do to give her pleasure, and drive away all recollection of
her ill-starred love.