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    RETRIBUTION. 253

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    ^ "I Have Done A Very Good Morning's Wor...

    at least they never told me anything- but facts . However , I was thankful to hearand the minute details Margaret sent me of

    very , every day ' s doings , seemed to carry me back to Mahon Court . One day , —I remember it so well , —it was a bright sunny morning ,

    I had walked out to meet the postman , who gave me a letter from Mrs . Mahon , longer than usual , but no word from Margaret ,

    who had not written to me for a long time . I opened it , and I could hardlcredit what I read . Mrs . Mahon told me that , to her

    great satisfaction y and delight , her dear Margaret was to become her daughter ; that she was doubly pleased because Charles had seemed

    to her so depressed for many months ; that they were both very happy ; and that she had written to tell " dear cousin Susan" by

    the very same post that carried the good news to Stephen . How bewildered I felt ! How I read and re-read that letter . I

    could hardly believe it , and yet what could be more natural ? Charlesdisappointed in the future he had began to build , drawn out

    , of his former way of life , and accustomed to Mildred's sympathy and companionshipof course had turned to Margaret ; and she

    , —could I be surprised ? She so affectionate , tractable , and impressionable . No , it was quite natural . Margaret had known very

    little of what had passed in the winter ; and , beyond an occasional wondering regret , or exclamation of how she missed " poor Mildred , "

    had not speculated or inquired farther . But Charles , Margaret , even Mildred , faded away before the

    thought of Stephen . His whole life blasted by these two unconscious hearts ! Or rather bhis own evil deed ; for here was the direct

    y retribution that comes now and then , just , as it -were , to -warn us that if our evil deeds do not find us out in this world , and recoil

    visibly upon our own heads , yet it is but a stretch of mercy that spares us ; and that veriland trulin one way or other , sometimes

    clearly to ourselves and sometimes y unrecognised y and unacknowledged , if we sow the windwe reap the whirlwind . Slowlysteadily ,

    un-, , flinchingly , touched neither by their sorrow nor the consciousness of his own injusticeStephen had done eviland hardened his heart

    , , and triumphed in his bad work ; and now—poor , poor Stephen . I would not have believed my heart could have ached so sorely for

    him . . But Mildred ! I had heard from her regularly too , but she never

    spoke of the Mahons . I wondered at myself at the time , that I did not feel more anxious and pained for her . Did I trust so much to

    her patient , contented self-control ? or had I some strange foreboding " of the _news which in a very few days reached me of her having

    sickened with fever ? She grew worse and worse ; her friends wrote to me by her desire , —and at last a black-edged letter brought me

    word of her death . And the mere external details were all I ever heard . Whether she had been told of Charles ' s marriage or not , I

    never knew , nor even how far her illness had been brought on or

    aggravated by the previous months of sorrow . No one but her

    Retribution. 253

    _RETRIBUTION . 253

• Citation
  • English Woman’s Journal (1858-1864), June 1, 1860, page 253, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/ewj/issues/ewj_01061860/page/37/