Whatever it was,
Jo perceived that her ideal man was become a real man; but, with a
tenacity of nature, for which in my fate-telling I had not given her
credit, she was as constant to the substance as she had been to the dream;
and while she lost both health and spirits in the contemplation of Arthur
Waring's fitful and heedless manner toward her, and was evidently pained
by the discovery of his selfish and politic traits,--to call them by no
harsher name,--it was inexpressibly touching to hear the excuses she made
for him, to see the all-shielding love with which she veiled his faults,
and kept him as a mother would keep her graceless, yet dearest child from
animadversion and reproach.
In the mean time I heard often from Letty,--no good news of her husband,
but that her child grew more and more a comfort, that her friends were
very kind, and always in a tiny postscript some such phrase as this: "I
try to be patient, Sarah," or "I don't scold Harry so much as I did,
dear." I hoped for Letty, for she persevered.
That summer we saw less than ever of Mr. Waring; he was very busy at the
mill in order that it might be far enough advanced to resist the
inevitable spring freshets; and besides, we were absent from the Valley
some weeks, endeavoring to recruit Jo's failing health at the sea-side.
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