She greeted Helen kindly, but warmly kissed Ruth, having become an admirer of the girl of the Red Mill some time before.
“Here’s my clever little girl,” she said, in her soft, drawling way. “I declare! Ev’ry time I put on my necklace I think of you, Ruthie Fielding, and how greatly beholden to you I am. I tell Nettie, here, that when she receives our heirloom at her coming-out party, she will thank you, too.”
“I don’t have to wait till then, Aunt Rachel!” cried Nettie, squeezing the plump shoulders of the girl of the Red Mill. “Isn’t it nice to see you both again? How jolly!”
“That’s a new word Nettie got up No’th,” said her Aunt Rachel. “Tell me, dears: Have they treated you right, here at the hotel?”
The girls assured her that the management had been very kind to them. Then the question was asked: What had they done to kill time?
Helen rattled off a dozen things she and Ruth had dabbled in that afternoon—or, “evening” as the Virginians say; but it was Ruth who mentioned their ride in the rain with old Unc’ Simmy.
“To the gatehouse? Where is that?” asked Aunt Rachel, lazily.
Between bursts of laughter Helen tried to tell her about the queer old negro and his dilapidated turnout; but it was Ruth who softly explained to Mrs. Parsons about Miss Catalpa and the faithful old darkey’s relations to her.
“Grogan?” repeated the lady. “Yes, yes, I remember the name. Who doesn’t? Major Grogan, her father, was a famous leader in the Lost Cause. Oh, dear me, Ruthie! We are still so poor in the South that the family of many a hero has come down to want. Catalpa Grogan? And you say she is blind?”
“She said we might come again and see her before we left the Point,” suggested Ruth, gently.