LETTERS AND LINKS.
That same September morning, Miss Euphrasia, sitting in her pretty corner room at Mrs. Georgeson's,—just returned to her city life from the rest and sweetness of a country summer,—had letters brought to her door.
The first was in a thin, strong, blue envelope, with London and Liverpool postmarks, and "per Steamer Calabria," written up in the corner, business-wise, with the date, and a dash underneath. This she opened first, for the English postmarks, associated with that handwriting, gave her a sudden thrill of bewildered surprise:—
"My dear Sister,—Within a very few days after this will reach you, I hope myself to land in America, and to see if, after all these years, you and I can do something about a home together. We learn one good of long separations, by what we get of them in this world. We can't help beginning again, if not actually where we left off, at least with the thought we left off at, 'live and fresh in our hearts. The thought, I mean, as regards each other; we have both got some thoughts uppermost by this time, doubtless, that we had not lived to then. At any rate, I have, who had ten years ago only the notions and dreams of twenty-one. I come straight to you with them, just as I went from you, dear elder sister, with your love and blessing upon me, into the great, working world.
"Send a line to meet me in New York at Frazer and Doubleday's, and let me know your exact whereabouts. I found Sherrett here, and had a run to Manchester with him to see Amy. That's the sort of thing I can't believe when I do see it,—Mary's baby married and housekeeping! I'm glad you are my elder, Effie; I shall not see much difference in you. Thirty-one and forty-three will only have come nearer together. And you are sure to be what only such fresh-souled women as you can be at forty-three."
With this little touch of loving compliment the letter ended.
Miss Euphrasia got up and walked over to her toilet-glass. Do you think, with all her outgoing goodness, she had not enough in her for this, of that sweet woman-feeling that desires a true beauty-blossoming for each good season of life as it comes? A pure, gentle showing, in face and voice and movement, of all that is lovely for a woman to show, and that she tells one of God's own words by showing, if only it be true, and not a putting on of falseness?
If Miss Euphrasia had not cared what she would seem like in the eyes as well as to the heart of this brother coming home, there would have been something wanting to her of genuine womanhood. Yet she had gone daily about her Lord's business, thinking of that first; not stopping to watch the graying or thinning of hairs, or the gathering of life-lines about eyes and mouth, or studying how to replace or smooth or disguise anything. She let her life write itself; she only made all fair, according to the sense of true grace that was in her; fair as she could with that which remained. She had neither neglected, nor feverishly contrived and worried; and so at forty three she was just what Christopher, with his Scotch second-sight, beheld her; what she beheld herself now as she went to look at her face in the glass, and to guess what he would think of it.
She saw a picture like this:—
Soft, large eyes, with no world-harass in them; little curves imprinted at the corners that may be as beautiful in later age as lip-dimples are in girlhood; a fair, broad forehead, that had never learned to frown; lines about mouth and chin, in sweet, honest harmony with the record of the eyes; no strain, no distortion of consciousness grown into haggard wornness; a fine, open, contented play of feature had wrought over all like a charm of sunshine, to soften and brighten continually. Her hair had been golden-brown; there was plenty of it still; it had kept so much of the gold that it was now like a tender mist through which the light flashes and smiles. Of all color-changes, this is the rarest.