Becoming Mrs. Thornton: A Sequel to North and South

Chapter 5

Chapter 5 – Becoming Mrs. Thornton – copyright Jill Hughey 2014

Margaret tugged on the strings of her reticule, listening avidly for the sounds of an approaching locomotive. Mr. Thornton, whom she had not seen in weeks, should arrive on the train at any moment. They would return together to Milton where she would stay under the same roof with him and his dragon. (It was sinful for her to think of Mrs. Thornton by that term. She simply could not help it after the horrid letter that had neither welcomed her visit nor congratulated her on the engagement. Indeed, the terse instructions could have been intended for a maid about to enter servitude at the house at Marlborough Mills!)

Captain Lennox had escorted her to the station and now rocked on the balls of his feet, enjoying the bustle of activity around them, unaware of his cousin-in-law’s pulse soaring as the southbound train thumped and screeched on the rails. Margaret scanned the opening doors of the carriages. She spied Mr. Thornton as he unfolded himself a few cars away. He stepped onto the platform before the train had even stopped.

“Ah, there he is,” the captain said. “Mr. Thornton, I have taken the liberty of buying Miss Hale’s ticket,” he called as a greeting.

Margaret did not speak. She could not, silenced again by the fact that Mr. Thornton was real, that he had come for her, that she would, indeed, go with him to plan their wedding in Milton. He shook her hand then tucked it around his arm, keeping his fingers pressed over hers as he and Captain Lennox shared the normal trivialities. She realized she was squeezing his forearm in an unladylike way, but when she relaxed her grip, he tightened his hand over hers as if he liked the pressure. He gazed down at her for a moment with a burning, hawkish focus that made her breath catch until his attention returned to Captain Lennox.

The northbound train came within a quarter hour. Captain Lennox helped with her few pieces of luggage, and then she was bundled into a carriage car with Mr. Thornton.

The train pulled out. Mr. Thornton turned to her and captured her face between his hands despite the rocking of the car. He leaned his forehead against hers. “Let us not be separated again for so long, love. I have been hard at work yet only half there all these weeks.”

She nodded and let herself be drawn in against him. He kissed her, thoroughly and well, before he nestled her against his side, where they rode for a long time in silence, blissful enough in their companionship to not need conversation.

*  *  *

Mrs. Thornton’s welcome was everything civil and nothing warm. Margaret was not surprised by their interaction, nor by the comfortable yet severe guest chamber she was assigned, nor by the directive to be at the dinner table in an hour. She was given the service of a maid named Jane, whom she recognized as one who had been in the house during the riot.

After changing into an evening dress and allowing Jane to arrange her hair in a feminine manner that need not survive the rigors of travel, Margaret dismissed the servant. She stood at the window to look down on the cobbles of the yard and the mill hands who continued their labors even though twilight dimmed the sky. The workers talked, and sometimes shouted, as they went from one building to another, carting and carrying with the industriousness of northern people. The white fluff of cotton offered the only softness in the scene, where it blew into the corners and caught at the edges of walls and curbs, muting the sooty, muddy angles of things.

Fifty-eight minutes after entering her room, she exited again to follow the dim hall to the stairs. John waited below, his lips curved in a restrained smile, his shirt for the evening blindingly white. “It is such a great pleasure to have you here,” he murmured when she reached the bottom step.