"
Meanwhile, Mrs. Vavasour, left all alone in the sitting-room,
stitched away in the lamplight, looking out from time to time
into the dewy garden, where the two figures were pacing up and
down. The murmur of their voices reached her, and presently
she also heard Madelon singing up above, and then the two went
away out of hearing, and she could distinguish nothing in the
silence but the rustling of her own work and the soft,
inarticulate sounds of the early night. She could guess pretty
well what the result of that talk would be. That very
afternoon, going to Maria's room on her return home, she had
found the girl in an agony of weeping, and had learnt from her
that Mr. Morris had just made her an offer, and that she had
been obliged to tell him that she was already engaged--and 'Oh!
what could Mr. Morris think of her, and what would Horace
think?' cried poor Maria, filled with remorse. And Mr. Morris
cared for her so much; he had been so miserable when she had
told him they must part, and said she was the only woman he
had seen that he could care for; and that was the only
reproach he had uttered, though she had treated him so badly.
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