Second Chance (a North and South tale)

Chapter 48: A sorrowful message

Mr Bell

Everything went rather quickly. There was a ceremony planned, the place of the burial on one of Oxfords cemeteries established, everyone of importance informed.

As we had the misfortunate situation happen while all of our Oxford friends were still in town for our meeting, most of the guests who would most likely be inclined to attend the funeral were already in great position to do so. Others were invited on short notice.

I left all the arrangements to be made by Hurst, as it was now my place to inform Margaret of her new orphaned state. She deserved to hear it from a friend and told from eye to eye, not from an unfeeling crisp piece of paper. I went off the train at the Milton train station and let the first delivery boy I found bring a note to Thornton.

"Mr. Thornton,

With a sorrowful heart, I have to inform you of the death of our dear friend Hale. I have traveled to Milton with the purpose of telling his daughter of the occurrence of this event.

I would ask for your assistance in this endeavor. I might be in need of your help in caring for Margaret after I broke the news to her.

Sincerely,

Bell"

I really hoped that he would receive the note on time. Not that I was afraid of having to care for someone deeply in pain. I just knew I would be no good at it. And it would present a perfect opportunity to give them a reason to work things out between them. The promise I gave my friend on his deathbed was still very present in my mind and as soon as I start to work out new strategies to honour my promise to him I shall rest peacefully for the rest of my life, knowing that Margaret was taken care of and that Hale would have his daughter and his only friend in Milton happy.

He mentioned Fred, when he talked about the having some kind of difficulties. Might she open up to him now?

After contemplating all this in my mind, I have finally found my way towards Crampton. Now that I was in the vicinity and was closer to the task at hand, I found myself at loss for words. What should I say? There was no gentle way to break the news. Standing in front of the entrance of their home, I was still stumbling over possible wordings.

Before I had a chance at forming any kind of sentence I was mercilessly thrown into the situation as the door opened and Margaret stood in front of me on the steps. It took merely one moment of my hesitation for her joyous expression to fall and after some seconds of searching for her father with her eyes and noticing his absence her facial expression turned from surprise to confusion and then to terror within the shortest amount of time that I could have imagined. My mourning attire probably took away her last doubt that her contemplations might be true.

Suddenly it was as if the world stopped revolving around the sun in her world, as she went into shock, unable to move on her own. She seemed to have lost all control over her body and fell forward, which made it necessary for me to lead her back into the house, as her legs weren't capable of supporting her weight. I brought her into the living room and sat her down onto one of the armchairs. Although I have been trying to get her to talk or at least utter some noise, give some kind of gesture to give me rest, to let me know the condition she was in, she was not giving me any clues.

Now I hoped for Thornton to be on time more than ever. This wasn't about any kind of business, this was a human being having the possibly worst time of their life, having no friend around but me, who did not know a thing about the handling of such delicate matters. Thornton would know how to take care of her, or at least would know how to bring a message to those who would care better for her than I will.

And every minute her posture didn't budge, her shocked state didn't give the slightest inclination that she was getting better, my anxiety rose to be an impossible atmosphere for me to be in, making it difficult for me to breathe. 

And again I apologize for the very short update. The next ones will get longer and more interesting.