Page:Between Two Loves.djvu/256

Rh was the judgment a partial or flattering one. He was a handsome man, simple, dignified, with a pleasant lace, and a look of kindly shrewdness in the eyes; a man quite worthy to win any good woman's confidence and affection.

He stopped at Steve's cottage as he went to the meeting. He had intended to wait until it was over, but he found himself unable to pass the door. Sarah turned her face towards him as he opened it, and at the sight of Jonathan she blushed crimson with pleasure. She sat at the fireside with the baby on her knee, and the little girl whose royal name had caused such heart-burnings was spelling out a lesson beside her. Joyce was in the large chair, folded in a blanket Her once pretty face was thin and faded, and she was in such a weak, hysterical condition that Jonathan's first kind words made her begin to cry.

"Nay, nay, woman," he said soothingly, "t' time for tears is mainly oover now. I saw Aske last night, and we talked about t' men that tried to murder him, and he said he could pick 'em out among a thousand anywhere. And when I told him thy Steve was in prison he was varry sorry. He said, 'Steve hed nowt to do wi' t'