A letter from your father, possibly withheld by that wicked Madam Bonnet--which is what Dickory and I both think--or some good words from the town that your father has sold his ship, and is on his way home.

Nobody knows what good news that Dickory may bring with him." The poor girl actually smiled.

She was young, and in the heart of youth there is always room for some good news, or for the hope of them.
But the smile vanished altogether when she went to her room and wrote a letter to Martin Newcombe.

In this letter, which was a long one, she told her lover how troubled she had been.

That she had nothing now to ask him about the bad news he had, in his kindness, forborne to tell her, and that when he saw Dickory Charter he might say to him from her that there was no need to make any further inquiries about her father; she knew enough, and far too much--more, most likely, than any one in Bridgetown knew.