Severed Selves and Shadows

"Now I would speak the last Farewell, but cannot;
It would be still Farewell a thousand times;
So let us part in the dumb pomp of grief."

* * * * *

"Rumor is a pipe
Blown by surmises, jealousies, conjectures,
And if so easy and so plain a stop
The still discordant, wavering multitude
Can play upon't."

At that time, Mary saw no more of her Cousin Allan. He had gone when she
rose next morning, gone away in a slow, even downpour of rain, that was
devoid of every hope of blue sky or sunshine. On the river they were in a
cloud of fog impenetrable to sight, and inexpressibly dreary. Everything
also in the little boat was clammy and uncomfortable. There was a long day
before Allan; for his business scarcely occupied him an hour, and then he
went out into the black, chill street, and felt thoroughly miserable. His
father's face had been so white, his hands had trembled so, he had made
such a brave effort to say a cheerful 'good-by.' Allan's conscience
troubled him; he felt supremely selfish, he could not satisfy himself that
he had any right to put so good a parent to so much sorrow.

If he could have written to Maggie, it would have been some consolation.
But he had not been able to make any arrangements for that solace. A post
office did not exist in Pittenloch; if a letter were addressed there, it
lay in Dysart until the Dysart postmistress happened to see some one from
Pittenloch. Under such circumstances, there was no telling into whose
hands his letters might fall. And a letter to Maggie Promoter from strange
parts, would be a circumstance to rouse unbounded curiosity. Either
curiosity would be illegitimately satisfied, or Maggie would be the object
of endless suspicions.