When he came back several hours later to bid her farewell she was lying
quiet with her eyes shut. Phebe whispered cautiously:
“She is asleep!”
The dark eyes opened quickly.
“I am not asleep. I was only thinking,” she said.
Then she met her brother-in-law’s kind eyes fixed on her full of pity.
She drew him down to her and whispered:
“I have been thinking of what I promised you, but I’m afraid it will be
useless to try, for how can I win him back if I never see him?”
“You must see him,” Doctor Charley replied firmly.
“But how? I can not send for him again, and he will not come of his own
will.”
“That is true. But, Molly--how strange it sounds to call you Molly! You
must get strong enough to go out of this room, to meet your husband
at the table, and in the parlor daily. You must accept invitations to
places where he will be compelled to attend you. Gradually you will win
him back to his old attendance on you, his old loving care. Then the
rest will be easy.”
“I will try, oh, so hard,” she said, and deeply moved, he pressed the
little nervous hand.
“When you get stronger you will write to me and tell me how you get
on with your labor of love,” he said. “And now, little sister, I must
bid you adieu, I must return to Paris tonight, having missed all the
lectures during the weeks I have been chasing that runaway Cecil.”
“God bless you for all your goodness to me,” she whispered, and he went
away with those grateful words ringing like music in his ears.
She turned wistfully to Phebe.
“Do you not think I am strong enough to go into the parlor tonight?”
“No, indeed, that you are not!” replied the maid decidedly, and after a
minute she added with a snort of displeasure, “besides there would be
no use. I heard Mrs. Laurens’ maid saying just now that her mistress
and Mr. Cecil were going to the opera with the Barrys. I’ll tell you
one thing, Mrs. Laurens. That yellow-eyed deceitful woman is going to
take your husband from you if she can!”
“She can not do that, for he is bound to me,” Molly exclaimed, but the
warning never left her thoughts, for she knew that Louise would try to
widen the gulf between her and Cecil until it should become impassable.
“It will be so easy to do that,” she thought, bitterly. “Ah, Doctor
Charley’s words were but sophistry. He will not let me win him back.
Perhaps already his thoughts have gone after beautiful Louise.”
Tortured by such thoughts as these it was no wonder that her strength
came back so slowly that Phebe would not consent to her leaving the
room for more than a week.
Indeed the maid would have liked to keep her mistress from mingling
at all with the rest of the family, for she knew that her orders to
the footman had been countermanded by Cecil, and that the Barrys were
frequent and honored guests at The Acacias.
Phebe knew another thing that made her uneasy for the sake of her
forlorn young mistress.
There was a conspiracy afoot to discharge her by way of punishment
for what was deemed her impertinence to Miss Barry. Phebe had heard
the rumor, but she kept silence, hoping that her young mistress would
insist on retaining her for her own sake.
About ten days after that marriage ceremony in the invalid’s chamber
Molly declared that she was well enough to go out of her room and that
she should breakfast with the family that morning.
Phebe gave a ready assent to the plan and dressed her very tastefully,
taking pains to bring out every one of her young mistress’ beauties by
her well-chosen morning dress.
Then she led her herself to the dining-room, fearful that her agitation
might make her faint by the way.
Mr. Laurens, his wife and son were already in the room. They looked up
in surprise at Molly’s entrance.
Poor Molly, poor trembling little culprit! She would have given worlds
for one kind look from her husband’s eyes. She turned an imploring
glance on his cold face, but he met it with one of surprise and
displeasure, supplemented by a slight bow, then let her take her seat
at the table without further notice.
Her mother-in-law made a curt inquiry after her health, and her
father-in-law supplemented it by a careless “Good-morning.”
Evidently her presence was unexpected and undesired by the small family.
The meal proceeded in embarrassing silence. Molly tried to eat, but
it was a melancholy and mechanical proceeding. She burned her tongue
with hot coffee, but she was afraid to cry out at the pain; she nearly
choked herself trying to swallow things that she put into her mouth
in the pretense of eating; and at last she gave it up and sat quiet,
with her eyes on her plate, until the ordeal was over. How she groped
her way to the morning-room she scarcely knew. Cecil had left the
dining-room before her, and she followed slowly in his train.
He was cutting the leaves of a book for his mother. At Molly’s entrance
he rose and placed a chair for her with distant courtesy.
She thanked him and sat down, and for some moments an embarrassing
silence reigned.
Cecil broke it with a curt sentence that made Molly start.
“You are better?” he said.
“Thank you, oh, yes, much better,” she faltered, grateful for even this
notice.
A glance at the pale, wan face did not assure him of the fact, but he
went on, pitilessly:
“You no longer need the care of a sick-nurse?”
“Oh, no,” she faltered again, miserably, feeling as if he desired the
negative; but she started when he exclaimed, with curt emphasis:
“I am very glad to hear it.”
“Why?” she faltered, looking up at him, but the handsome face was
averted.
But he had heard the timid question, for presently he answered, coldly:
“I have been trying to be patient and wait until you were able to
dispense with your maid. That impertinent woman has to go!”
“My good Phebe to leave me? Oh, I can not let her go!” Molly cried,
wildly; but Cecil answered, relentlessly:
“I expected this. It does not matter to you that the woman has been
grossly impertinent to my mother and to our friend, Miss Barry.
Perhaps,” scornfully, “you tutored her to that end.”
“I cannot let her go!” Molly cried, her head dropping forlornly on her
breast.
“She shall go! She has been rude to my mother, and my wife, as her
guest, has no right to retain a servant distasteful to her hostess,”
Cecil said, loftily.
She hesitated a moment, then said, desperately:
“Take me away, then, to a home of my own, where none can interfere with
my choice of a servant.”
He answered instantly, with offensive _hauteur_:
“Under the present circumstances, such a course would not be agreeable!”
He turned away and stood at the window, with his back to her,
determined not to be moved by the sight of the little hands writhing in
and out of each other in her lap, and the face with its expression of
dumb, patient agony, while hot tears stole from under her lashes and
dripped down her cheeks.
The door opened, and his proud, stately mother entered with her
graceful, gliding motion. She frowned when she saw poor Molly sitting
there with the tears stealing down her cheeks.
“If you are ill, Mrs. Laurens, perhaps I had better assist you to your
room,” she said, with pointed courtesy.
Molly shook her head without reply, and Cecil turned around.
“She is not ill, mother; she is angry,” he said, sharply.
“Angry?”
“Yes. I have been telling her that Phebe must go, and she objects.”
“Objects, Cecil?” loftily. “Surely she would not wish to retain a
servant who had been rude to _me_?”
“She is my only friend,” Molly muttered, in a despairing tone, and the
mother-in-law rejoined, testily:
“I might say that you do not deserve any friends, if I chose to speak
plainly, but I do not wish to wound you. You can not expect me to
retain that woman at The Acacias. I have secured another maid for
you--a splendid woman with a good recommendation--and she will take
Phebe’s place tomorrow.”
From the pale lips of the despised young wife came a moan of
remonstrance; but no one heeded it, for Cecil had gone abruptly out of
the room, and Mrs. Laurens, after her final sentence, sat down coolly
to her book.
Phebe had been on the alert and knew that Cecil had taken his hat and
left the house.
She peered into the morning-room and saw her young mistress in tears
and her mother-in-law absorbed in her novel.
Stalking boldly across the room, she said:
“You are tired out with coming down to breakfast, Mrs. Laurens. Hadn’t
you better come back to your room and rest?”
Molly put her hand on the strong arm and went away sobbing unheeded by
the reader, who did not turn her head to notice the departure.
“Now then, who has hurt you, my pet?” Phebe demanded when she had laid
Molly down on her soft sofa, and with bitter sobs the whole story was
blurted out, for Molly’s heart was too full to hold it.
“Phebe, if they send you away I shall go with you. I will not be parted
from the only friend that is left to me,” she exclaimed.
Phebe stroked the pretty, dark head in silence some minutes before she
replied, gravely:
“No, my dear young mistress, you must not defy your husband like that
or you will never win him back. You must give me up as he wishes you to
do, and perhaps when he sees how you obey his wishes even against your
own desire he will send for me to come back to you soon, for I don’t
think his anger can hold out long, seeing how sweet and humble and good
you are.”
After a few moments she continued, sadly:
“I have known this for some time, Mrs. Laurens, but I would not
distress you with it. But now I will give you one warning. Mrs. Laurens
has hired a maid for you who was selected and recommended by Miss
Louise Barry. Hush, my dear! Do not say you will not have her, for that
would anger your husband. Let her come, but be wary and watchful. She
may be a tool in Miss Barry’s hands and may mean to do you harm at her
instigation.”