"You stood before me like a thought,
A dream remembered in a dream."
--Coleridge.
It is five o'clock in the afternoon, and Herst is the richer by one
more inmate. Molly has arrived, has been received by Marcia, has
pressed cheeks with her, has been told she is welcome in a palpably
lying tone, and finally has been conducted to her bedroom. Such a
wonder of a bedroom compared with Molly's snug but modest sanctum at
home,--a very marvel of white and blue, and cloudy virginal muslins,
and filled with innumerable luxuries.
Molly, standing in the centre of it,--unaware that she is putting all
its other beauties to shame--gazes round her in silent admiration,
appreciates each pretty trifle to its fullest, and finally feels a
vague surprise at the curious sense of discontent that pervades her.
Her reception so far has not been cordial. Marcia's cold unloving eyes
have pierced her and left a little cold frozen spot within her heart.
She is chilled and puzzled, and with all her strength is wishing
herself home again at Brooklyn, with John and Letty, and all the merry,
tormenting, kindly children.
"What shall I do for you now, Miss Molly?" asks Sarah, presently
breaking in upon these dismal broodings. This antiquated but devoted
maiden has stationed herself at the farthest end of the big room close
to Molly's solitary trunk (as though suspicious of lurking thieves),
and bears upon her countenance a depressed, not to say dejected,
expression. "Like mistress, like maid," she, too, is filled with the
gloomiest forebodings.
"Open my trunk and take out my clothes," says Molly, making no effort
at disrobing, beyond a melancholy attempt at pulling off her gloves,
finger by finger.
Sarah does as she is bidden.
"'Tis a tremenjous house, Miss Molly."
"Very. It is a castle, not a house."
"There's a deal of servants in it."
"Yes," absently.
"Leastways as far as I could judge with looking through the corners of
my eyes as I came along them big passages. From every door a'most there
popped a head bedizened with gaudy ribbons, and I suppose the bodies
was behind 'em."
"Let us hope so, Sarah." Rising, and laughing rather hysterically. "The
bare idea that those mysterious heads should lack a decent finish fills
me with the liveliest horror." Then, in a brighter tone, "Why, what is
the matter with you, Sarah? You look as if you had fallen into the very
lowest depths of despair."
"Not so much that as lonesome, miss; they all seem so rich and grand
that I feel myself out of place."
Molly smiles a little. After all, in spite of the difference in their
positions, it is clear to her that she and her maid share pretty much
the same fears.
"There was a very proud look about the set of their caps," says Sarah,
waxing more and more dismal. "Suppose they were to be uncivil to me,
Miss Molly, on account of my being country-reared and my gowns not
being, as it were, in the height of the fashion, what should I do? It
is all this, miss, that is weighing me down."
"Suppose, on the contrary," says her mistress, with a little defiant
ring in her tone, stepping to the glass and surveying her beautiful
face with eager scrutiny, "you were to make a sensation, and cut out
all these supercilious dames in your hall, how would it be then? Come,
Sarah, let me teach you your new duties. First take my hat, now my
jacket, now----"
"Shall I do your hair, Miss Molly?"
"No," with a laugh,--"I think not. I had one trial of you in that
respect; it was enough."
"But all maids do their young ladies' hair, don't they, miss? I doubt
they will altogether look down upon me when they find I can't do even
that."
"I shall ring for you every day when I come to dress for dinner. Once
in my room, who shall know whether you do my hair or not? And I
faithfully promise you, Sarah, to take such pains with the performance
myself as shall compel every one in the house to admire it and envy me
my excellent maid. 'See Miss Massereene's hair!' they will say, in
tearful whispers. 'Oh, that I too could have a Sarah!' By the bye, call
me Miss Massereene for the future, not Miss Molly,--at least until we
get home again."
"Yes, Miss--Massereene. Law! it do sound odd," says Sarah, with a
little respectful laugh, "but high-sounding too, I think. I do hope I
shan't forget it, Miss Molly. Perhaps you will be good enough to remind
me when I go wrong?"
A knock at the door prevents reply. Molly cries out, "Come in," and,
turning, finds herself face to face with a fine old woman, who stands
erect, and firm, in spite of her many years, in the doorway. She is
clad in a sombre gown of brown silk, and has an old-fashioned chain
round her neck that hangs far below her waist, which is by no means the
most contemptible portion of her.
"I beg your pardon, Miss Massereene; I could not resist coming to see
if you were quite comfortable," she says, respectfully.
"Quite, thank you," replies Molly, in a degree puzzled. "You
are"--smiling--"the housekeeper?"
"I am. And you, my dear,"--regarding her anxiously,--"are every inch an
Amherst, in spite of your bonny blue eyes. You will forgive the freedom
of my speech," says this old dame, with an air that would not have
disgraced a duchess, "when I tell you I nursed your mother."
"Ah! did you?" says Molly, flushing a little, and coming up to her
eagerly, with both hands extended, to kiss the fair old face that is
smiling so kindly on her. "But how could one think it? You are yet so
fresh, so good to look at."
"Tut, my dear," says the old lady, mightily pleased nevertheless. "I am
old enough to have nursed your grandmother. And now can I do anything
for you?"
"You can," replies Molly, turning toward Sarah, who is regarding them
with an expression that might at any moment mean either approval or
displeasure. "This is my maid. We are both strangers here. Will you see
that she is made happy?"
"Come with me, Sarah, and I will make you acquainted with our
household," says Mrs. Nesbitt, promptly.
As the door closes behind them, leaving her to her own society, a
rather unhappy shade falls across Molly's face.
A sensation of isolation--loneliness--oppresses her. Indeed, her
discouraging reception has wounded her more than she cares to confess
even to her own heart. If they did not want her at Herst, why had they
invited her? If they did want her, surely they might have met her with
more civility; and on this her first visit her grandfather at least
might have been present to bid her welcome.
Oh, that this hateful day were at an end! Oh, for some way of making
the slow hours run hurriedly!
With careful fingers she unfastens and pulls down all her lovely hair
until it falls in rippling masses to her waist. As carefully, as
lingeringly, she rolls it up again into its usual artistic knot at the
back of her head. With still loitering movements she bathes the dust of
travel from her face and hands, adjusts her soft gray gown, puts
straight the pale-blue ribbon at her throat, and now tells herself,
with a triumphant smile, that she has got the better of at least half
an hour of this detested day.
Alas! alas! the little ormolu ornament that ticks with such provoking
_empressement_ upon the chimney-piece assures her that her robing
has occupied exactly ten minutes from start to finish.
This will never do. She cannot well spend her evening in her own room,
no matter how eagerly she may desire to do so; so, taking heart of
grace, she makes a wicked _moue_ at her own rueful countenance in
the looking-glass, and, opening her door hastily, lest her courage fail
her, runs down the broad oak staircase into the hall beneath.
Quick-witted, as women of her temperament always are, she remembers the
situation of the room she had first entered, and, passing by all the
other closed doors, goes into it, to find herself once more in Marcia's
presence.
"Ah! you have come," says Miss Amherst, looking up languidly from her
_macrame_, with a frozen smile that owes its one charm to its
brevity. "You have made a quick toilet." With a supercilious glance at
Molly's Quakerish gown, that somehow fits her and suits her to
perfection. "You are not fatigued?"
"Fatigued?" Smiling, with a view to conciliation. "Oh, no; it is such a
little journey."
"So it is. How strange this should be our first meeting, living so
close to each other as we have done! My grandfather's peculiar
disposition of course accounts for it: he has quite a morbid horror of
aliens."
"Is one's granddaughter to be considered an alien?" asks Molly, with a
laugh. "The suggestion opens an enormous field for reflection. If so,
what are one's nephews, and one's nieces, and cousins, first, second,
and third? Poor third-cousins! it makes one sad to think of them."
"I think perhaps Mr. Amherst's incivility toward you arose from his
dislike to your mother's marriage. You don't mind my speaking, do you?
It was more than good of you to come here at all, considering the
circumstances,--I don't believe I could have been so forgiving,--but I
know he felt very bitterly on the subject, and does so still."
"Does he? How very absurd! Amhersts cannot always marry Amhersts, nor
would it be a good thing if they could. I suppose, however, even he can
be forgiving at times. Now, for instance, how did he get over your
father's marriage?"
Marcia raises her head quickly. Her color deepens. She turns a glance
full of displeased suspicion upon her companion, who meets it calmly,
and with such an amount of innocence in hers as might have disarmed a
Machiavelli. Not a shadow of intention mars her expression; her
widely-opened blue eyes contain only a desire to know; and Marcia,
angry, disconcerted, and puzzled, lets her gaze return to her work. A
dim idea that it will not be so easy to ride rough-shod over this
country-bred girl as she had hoped oppresses her, while a still more
unpleasant doubt that her intended snubbing has recoiled upon her own
head adds to her discontent. Partly through policy and partly with a
view to showing this recreant Molly the rudeness of her ways, she
refuses an answer to her question and starts a different topic in a
still more freezing tone.
"You found your room comfortable, I hope, and--all that?"
"Quite all that, thank you," cordially. "And such a pretty room too!"
(She is unaware as she speaks that it is one of the plainest the house
contains.) "How large everything seems! When coming down through all
those corridors and halls I very nearly lost my way. Stupid of me was
it not? But it is an enormous house, I can see."
"Is it? Perhaps so. Very much the size of most country houses, I should
say. And yet, no doubt, to a stranger it would seem large. Your own
home is not so?"
"Oh, no. If you could only see poor Brooklyn in comparison! It is the
prettiest little place in all the world, I think; but then it _is_
little. It would require a tremendous amount of genius to lose one's
self in Brooklyn."
"How late it grows!" says Marcia, looking at the clock and rising. "The
first bell ought to ring soon. Which would you prefer,--your tea here
or in your own room? I always adopt the latter plan when the house is
empty, and take it while dressing. By the bye, you have not seen--Mr.
Amherst?"
"My grandfather? No."
"Perhaps he had better be told you are here."
"Has he not yet heard of my arrival?" asks Molly, impulsively, some
faint indignation stirring in her breast.
"He knew you were coming, of course; I am not sure if he remembered the
exact hour. If you will come with me, I will take you to the library."
Across the hall in nervous silence Molly follows her guide until they
reach a small anteroom, beyond which lies the "chamber of horrors," as,
in spite of all her efforts to be indifferent, Molly cannot help
regarding it.
Marcia knocking softly at the door, a feeble but rasping voice bids
them enter; and, throwing it widely open, Miss Amherst beckons her
cousin to follow her into the presence of her dreaded grandfather.
Although looking old, and worn, and decrepit, he is still evidently in
much better health than when last we saw him, trundling up and down the
terraced walk, endeavoring to catch some faint warmth from the burning
sun.
His eyes are darker and fiercer, his nose a shade sharper, his temper
evidently in an uncorked condition; although he may be safely said to
be on the mend, and, with regard to his bodily strength, in a very
promising condition.
Before him is a table covered with papers, from which he looks up
ungraciously, as the girls enter.
"I have brought you Eleanor Massereene," says Marcia, without preamble,
in a tone so kind and gentle as makes Molly even at this awful moment
marvel at the change.
If it could be possible for the old man's ghastly skin to assume a
paler hue, at this announcement, it certainly does so. With suppressed
but apparent eagerness he fixes his eyes upon the new grandchild, and
as he does so his hand closes involuntarily upon the paper beneath it;
his mouth twitches; a shrinking pain contracts his face. Yes, she is
very like her dead mother.
"How long has she been in my house?" he asks, presently, after a pause
that to Molly has been hours, still with his gaze upon her, though
beyond this prolonged examination of her features he has vouchsafed her
no welcome.
"She came by the half-past four train. Williams met her with the
brougham."
"And it is nearly six. Pray why have I been kept so long in ignorance
of her arrival?" Not once as he speaks does he look at Marcia, or at
anything but Molly's pale, pretty, disturbed face.
"Dear grandpapa, you have forgotten. Yesterday I told you the hour we
expected her. But no doubt, with so many important matters upon your
mind," with a glance at the littered table, "you forgot this one."
"I did," slowly, "so effectually as to make me doubt having ever heard
it. No, Marcia, no more excuses, no more lies: you need not explain. Be
satisfied that whatever plans you formed to prevent my bidding your
cousin welcome to my house were highly successful. At intrigue you are
a proficient. I admire proficiency in all things,--but--for the future--be
so good as to remember that I _never_ forget."
"Dear grandpapa," with a pathetic but very distinct sigh, "it is very
hard to be misjudged!"
"Granted. Though at times one must own it has its advantages. Now, if
for instance I could only bring myself, now and again, to misjudge you,
how very much more conducive to the accomplishment of your aims it
would be! Leave the room. I wish to speak to your cousin."
Reluctant, but not daring to disobey, and always with the same
aggrieved expression upon her face, Marcia withdraws.
As the door closes behind her, Mr. Amherst rises, and holds out one
hand to Molly.
"You are welcome," he says, quietly, but coldly, and evidently speaking
with an effort.
Molly, coming slowly up to him, lays her hand in his, while entertaining
an earnest hope that she will not be called upon to seal the interview
with a kiss.
"Thank you," she says, faintly, not knowing what else to say, and
feeling thoroughly embarrassed by the fixity and duration of his
regard.
"Yes," speaking again, slowly, and absently. "You are welcome--Eleanor.
I am glad I have seen you before--my death. Yes--you are very like----
Go!" with sudden vehemence, "leave me; I wish to be alone."
Sinking back heavily into his arm-chair, he motions her from him, and
Molly, finding herself a moment later once more in the anteroom,
breathes a sigh of thankfulness that this her first strange interview
with her host is at an end.
* * * * *
"Dress me quickly, Sarah," she says, as she gains her own room about
half an hour later, and finds that damsel awaiting her. "And make me
look as beautiful as possible; I have yet another cousin to investigate,
and something tells me the third will be the charm, and that I shall get
on with him. Young men"--ingenuously, and forgetting she is expressing
her thoughts aloud--"are certainly a decided improvement on young women.
If, however, there is really any understanding between Philip and
Marcia, it will rather spoil my amusement and--still I need not torment
myself beforehand, as that is a matter I shall learn in five minutes."
"There's a very nice young man down-stairs, miss," breaks in Sarah, at
this juncture, with a simper that has the pleasing effect of making one
side of her face quite an inch shorter than the other.
"What! you have seen him, then?" cries Molly, full of her own idea, and
oblivious of dignity. "Is he handsome, Sarah? Young? Describe him to
me."
"He is short, miss, and stoutish, and--and----"
"Yes! Do go on, Sarah, and take that smile off your face: it makes you
look downright imbecile. 'Short!' 'Stout!' Good gracious! of what on
earth could Teddy have been thinking."
"His manners is most agreeable, miss, and altogether he is a most
gentleman-like young man."
"Well, of course he is all that, or he isn't anything; but stout!----"
"Not a bit stiffish, or uppish, as one might expect, considering where
he come from. And indeed, Miss Molly," with an irrepressible giggle,
"he did say as how----"
"What!" icily.
"As how I had a very bewidging look about the eyes."
"Sarah," exclaims Miss Massereene, sinking weakly into a chair, "do you
mean to tell me my cousin Philip--Captain Shadwell--told you--had the
impertinence to speak to you about----"
"Law, Miss Molly, whatever are you thinking about?--Captain Shadwell!
why, I haven't so much as laid eyes on him! I was only speaking of his
young man, what goes by the name of Peters."
"Ridiculous!" cries Molly, impatiently; then bursting into a merry
laugh, she laughs so heartily and so long that the somewhat puzzled
Sarah feels compelled to join.
"'Short, and stout, and gentlemanly'--ha, ha, ha! And so Peters said
you were bewidging, Sarah? Ah! take care, and do not let him turn your
head: if you _do_, you will lose all your fun, and gain little for
it. Is that a bell? Oh, Sarah! come, dispatch, dispatch, or I shall be
late, and eternally disgraced."
The robing proceeds, and when finished leaves Molly standing before her
maid with (it must be confessed) a very self-satisfied smirk upon her
countenance.
"How am I looking, Sarah? I want a candid opinion; but on no account
say anything disparaging."
"Lovely!" says Sarah, with comfortable haste. "There's no denying it,
Miss Molly. Miss Amherst below, for all her dark hair and eyes (and I
don't say but that she is handsome), could not hold a candle to you, as
the saying is--and that's a fact."
"Is there anything in all the world," says Miss Massereene, "so sweet
as sincere praise? Sarah, you are a charming creature. Good-bye; I
go--let us hope--to victory. But if not,--if I find the amiable
relatives refuse to acknowledge my charms I shall at least know where
to come to receive the admiration I feel I so justly deserve!"
So saying, with a little tragic flourish, she once more wends her way
down-stairs, trailing behind her her pretty white muslin gown, with its
flecks of coloring, blue as her eyes, into the drawing-room.
The close of autumn brings to us a breath of winter. Already the
daylight has taken to itself wings and flown partially away; and
though, as yet, a good deal of it through compassion lingers, it is but
a half-hearted dallying that speaks of hurry to be gone.
The footman, a young person, of a highly morbid and sensitive
disposition, abhorrent of twilights, has pulled down all the blinds in
the sitting-rooms, and drawn the curtains closely, has lit the lamps,
and poked into a blaze the fire, that Mr. Amherst has the wisdom to
keep burning all the year round in the long chilly room.
Before the fire, with one arm on the mantel-piece, and one foot upon
the fender, stands a young man, in an attitude suggestive of
melancholy. Hearing the rustling of a woman's garments, he looks up,
and, seeing Molly, stares at her, first lazily, then curiously, then
amazedly, then----
She is quite close to him; she can almost touch him; indeed, no farther
can she go without putting him to one side; and still he has not
stirred. The situation grows embarrassing, so embarrassing that, what
with the ludicrous silence and Philip Shadwell's eyes which betray a
charmed astonishment, Molly feels an overpowering desire to laugh. She
compromises matters by smiling, and lowering her eyelids just half an
inch.
"You do not want all the fire, do you?" she asks, demurely, in a low
tone.
"I beg your pardon," exclaims Philip, in his abstraction, moving in a
direction closer to the fire, rather than from it. "I had no idea I
was. I"--doubtfully, "am I speaking to Miss Massereene?"
"You are. And I--I know I am speaking to Captain Shadwell."
"Yes," slowly. "That is my name,--Philip Shadwell."
"We are cousins, then," says Molly, kindly, as though desirous of
putting him at his ease. "I hope we shall be, what is far better,
friends."
"We must be; we are friends," returns he, hastily, so full of surprise
and self-reproach as to be almost unconscious of his words.
Is this the country cousin full of freckles and _mauvaise honte_,
who was to be pitied, and lectured, and taught generally how to
behave?--whose ignorance was to draw forth groans from pit and gallery
and boxes? A hot blush at his own unmeant impertinence thrills him from
head to foot. Were she ever, by any chance, to hear what he had said.
Oh, perish the thought!--it is too horrible!
A little laugh from Molly somewhat restores his senses.
"You should not stare so," she says, severely, with an adorable attempt
at a frown. "And you need not look at me all at once, you know,
because, as I am going to stay here a whole month, you will have plenty
of time to do it by degrees, without fatiguing yourself. By the bye,"
reproachfully, "I have come a journey to-day, and am dreadfully tired,
and you have never even offered me a chair; must I get one for myself?"
"You have driven any manners I may possess out of my head," replies he,
laughing, too, and pushing toward her the coziest chair the room
contains. "Your sudden entrance bewildered me; you came upon me like an
apparition; more especially as people in this house never get to the
drawing-room until exactly one minute before dinner is announced."
"Why?"
"Lest we should bore each other past forgiveness. Being together as we
are every day, and all day long, one can easily imagine how a very
little more pressure would smash the chains of politeness. You may have
heard of the last straw and its disastrous consequences?"
"I have. I am sorry I frightened you. To-morrow night I shall know
better, and shall leave you to your silent musings in peace."
"No; don't do that!" says her companion, earnestly. "On no account do
that. I think the half-hour before dinner, sitting by the fire, alone,
as we are now, the best of the whole day; that is, of course, if one
spends it with a congenial companion."
"Are you a congenial companion?"
"I don't know," smiling. "If you will let me, I can at least try to
be."
"Try, then, by all means." In a moment or two,--"I should like to
fathom your thoughts," says Molly. "When I came in, there was more than
bewilderment in your face; it showed--how shall I express it? You
looked as though you had expected something else?"
"Will you forgive me if I say I did?"
"What, then? A creature tall, gaunt, weird----?"
"No."
"Fat, red, uncomfortable?"
This touches so nearly on the truth as to be unpleasant. He winces.
"I will tell you what I did not expect," he says, hastily, coloring a
little. "How should I? It is so seldom one has the good luck to
discover in autumn a rose belonging to June."
His voice falls.
"Am I one?" asks she, looking with dangerous frankness into the dark
eyes above her, that are telling her silently, eloquently, she is the
fairest, freshest, sweetest queen of flowers in all the world.
The door opens, and Mr. Amherst enters, then Marcia. Philip straightens
himself, and puts on his usual bored, rather sulky expression. Molly
smiles upon her grumpy old host. He offers her his arm, Philip does the
same to Marcia, and together they gain the dining-room.
It is an old, heavily wainscoted apartment, gloomy beyond words, so
immense that the four who dine in it tonight appear utterly lost in its
vast centre.
Marcia, in an evening toilet of black and ivory, sits at the head of
the table, her grandfather opposite to her. Philip and Molly are
_vis-a-vis_ at the sides. Behind stand the footmen, as sleek and
well-to-do, and imbecile, as one can desire.
There is a solemnity about the repast that strikes but fails to subdue
Molly. It has a contrary effect, making her spirits rise, and creating
in her a very mistaken desire for laughter. She is hungry too, and
succeeds in eating a good dinner, while altogether she comes to the
conclusion that it may not be wholly impossible to put in a very good
time at Herst.
Never does she raise her eyes without encountering Philip's dark ones
regarding her with the friendliest attention. This also helps to
reassure her. A friend in need is a friend indeed, and this friend is
handsome as well as kind, although there is a little something or
other, a suppressed vindictiveness, about his expression, that repels
her.
She compares him unfavorably with Luttrell, and presently lets her
thoughts wander on to the glad fact that to-morrow will see the latter
by her side, when indeed she will be in a position to defy fate,--and
Marcia. Already she has learned to regard that dark-browed lady with
distrust.
"Is any one coming to-morrow?" asks Mr. Amherst, _a propos_ of
Molly's reverie."
"Tedcastle, and Maud Darley."
"Her husband?"
"I suppose so. Though she did not mention him when writing."
"Poor Darley!" with a sneer: "she never does mention him. Any one
else?"
"Not to-morrow."
"I wonder if Luttrell will be much altered," says Philip; "browned, I
suppose, by India, although his stay there was of the shortest."
"He is not at all bronzed," breaks in Molly, quietly.
"You know him?" Marcia asks, in a rather surprised tone, turning toward
her.
"Oh, yes, very well," coloring a little. "That is, he was staying with
us for a short time at Brooklyn."
"Staying with you?" her grandfather repeats, curiously. It is evidently
a matter of wonder with them, her friendship with Tedcastle.
"Yes, he and John, my brother, are old friends. They were at school
together, although John is much older, and he says----"
Mr. Amherst coughs, which means he is displeased, and turns his head
away. Marcia gives an order to one of the servants in a very distinct
tone. Philip smiles at Molly, and Molly, unconscious of offense, is
about to return to the charge, and give a lengthened account of her
tabooed brother, when luckily she is prevented by a voice from behind
her chair, which says:
"Champagne, or Moselle?"
"Champagne," replies Molly, and forgets her brother for the moment.
"I thought all women were prejudiced in favor of Moselle," says Philip,
addressing her hastily, more from a view to hinder a recurrence to the
forbidden topic than from any overweening curiosity to learn her taste
in wines. "Are not you?"
"I am hardly in a position to judge," frankly, "as I have never tasted
Moselle, and champagne only once. Have I shocked you? Is that a very
lowering admission?"
Mr. Amherst coughs again. The corners of Marcia's mouth take a
disgusted droop. Philip laughs out loud.
"On the contrary, it is a very refreshing one," he says, in an
interested and deeply amused tone, "more especially in these degenerate
days when most young ladies can tell one to a turn the precise age,
price, and retailer of one's wines. May I ask when was this memorable
'once'?"
"At the races at Loaminster. Were you ever there? I persuaded my
brother to take me there the spring before last, and he went."
"We were there that year, with a large party," says Marcia. "I do not
remember seeing you on the stand."
"We were not on it. We drove over, John and I and Letty, in the little
trap, a Norwegian, and dreadfully shaky it was, but we did not care,
and we sat in it all day, and saw everything very well. Then a friend
of John's, a man in the Sixty-second, came up, and asked to be
introduced to me, and afterward others came, and persuaded us to have
luncheon with them in their marquee. It was there," nodding at Philip,
"I got the champagne. We had great fun, I remember, and altogether it
was quite the pleasantest day I ever spent in my life."
As she speaks, she dimples, and blushes, and beams all over her pretty
face as she recalls that day's past glories.
"The Sixty-second?" says Marcia. "I recollect. A very second-rate
regiment I thought it. There was a Captain Milburd in it, I remember."
"That was John's friend," says Molly, promptly; "he was so kind to me
that day. Did you like him?"
"Like him! A man all broad plaid and red tie. No, I certainly did not
like him."
"His tie!" says Molly, laughing gayly at the vision she has conjured
up,--"it certainly _was_ red. As red as that rose," pointing to a
blood-colored flower in the centre of a huge china bowl of priceless
cost, that ornaments the middle of the table, and round which, being
opposite to him, she has to peer to catch a glimpse of Philip. "It was
the reddest thing I ever saw, except his complexion. But I forgave him,
he was so good-natured."
"Does good-nature make up for everything?" asks Philip, dodging the
bowl in his turn to meet her eyes.
"For most things. Grandpapa," pointing to a family portrait over the
chimney-piece that has attracted her attention ever since her entrance,
"whose is that picture?"
"Your grandmother's. It is like you, but," says the old man with his
usual gracefulness, "it is ten times handsomer."
"_Very_ like you," thinks the young man, gazing with ever
increasing admiration at the exquisite tints and shades and changes in
the living face before him, "only you are ten thousand times more
beautiful!"
Slowly, and with much unnecessary delay, the dinner drags to an end,
only to be followed by a still slower hour in the drawing-room.
Mr. Amherst challenges Philip to a game of chess, that most wearisome
of games to the on-looker, and so arranges himself that his antagonist
cannot, without risking his neck, bestow so much as a glance in Miss
Massereene's direction.
Marcia gets successfully through two elaborate fantasies upon the
piano, that require rather more than the correct brilliancy of her
touch to make up for the incoherency of their composition; while Molly
sits apart, dear soul, and wishes with much devoutness that the
inventor of chess had been strangled at his birth.
At ten o'clock precisely Mr. Amherst rises, having lost his game, and a
good deal of his temper, and expresses his intention of retiring
without delay to his virtuous slumbers. Marcia asks Molly whether she
too would not wish to go to her room after the day's fatigue; at which
proposition Molly grasps with eagerness. Philip lights her
candle,--they are in the hall together,--and then holds out his hand.
"Do you know we have not yet gone through the ceremony of shaking
hands?" he says, with a kindly smile, and a still more kindly pressure;
which I am afraid met with some faint return. Then he wishes her a good
night's rest, and she wends her way up-stairs again, and knows the
long-thought-of, hoped-for, much-dreaded day is at an end.