Lady Mary did not observe his silence, because her own thoughts were busy with a scene which memory had painted for her, and far away from the moonlit valley of the Youle.

She saw a tall, narrow, turreted building against a ruddy sunset sky; a bare ridge of hills crowned sparsely with ragged Scotch firs; a sea of heather which had seemed boundless to a childish imagination.
"I could not go back to Scotland now," she said, with that little wistful-sounding, patient sob which moved John to such pity that he could scarce contain himself; "but some day, when I am free--when nobody wants me." "London is the only place worth living in just now, whilst we are in such terrible anxiety," he said boldly.

"At least there are the papers and telegrams all day long, and none of this dreary, long waiting between the posts; and there are other things--to distract one's attention, and keep up one's courage." "I do not know what Isabella and Georgina would say," said Lady Mary.
"But you--would you not care to come ?" "Oh!" she said, half sobbing, "it is because I am afraid of caring too much.

Life seems to call so loudly to me now and then; as though I were tired of sitting alone, and looking up the valley and down the valley.

I know it all by heart.