I was to write and have my letter go in a package Mr. Dole was to send. So when I had it finished I went over to the warehouse, for I would not trust it with Ben. I had some trouble to find Mr. Dole, and explained the matter to him.
"Yes, yes," he said, "I shall be glad to do this for you. I think he will be in Quebec before it reaches him, however."
"Thank you," I replied, with a little curtsy.
CHAPTER IX
WAS EVER LETTER HALF SO DEAR?
How eagerly we devoured the paper when the new President was inaugurated. The Whig party had a ball at the Tremont Hotel, and the young ladies who went held their heads very high for weeks. Polly Morrison and Peggy Garnier were the two belles. Miss Garnier was among the immigrants from the border of Kentucky. Her father had taken a great interest in cattle raising and packing. There were two smaller girls and a son, who certainly was a spoiled darling, even in those days. Margaret Garnier was tall and really handsome. Sixteen was grown up at that period. She had large, beautiful black eyes, and a great coil of black hair which, those who knew, said came down to her knees. A brunette complexion, not very dark, and color in her cheeks like an opening rose; by all odds, the handsomest girl in the room, it was said.
But Polly Morrison pressed her hard. She was tall and slim and with the litheness of figure that made every movement fascinating. And as for her dancing, every man was crazy to dance with her, and when he had danced once he was bewitched and bound to dance again. She must have had some charm in spite of her red hair and her peculiar eyes. Her skin was very white and she rarely flushed all over her face, even when she had been dancing at her wildest.
Some of the girls in school had sisters or brothers who were present. Many of the married people went as well. I sat at home and studied my lessons, then knit some rounds on a pair of white wool stockings for myself, while M'liss told of some dances she had been to out at the old fort.
"An' how I could come to be sech an idjit as to marry Jed Hatch I can't fer the life of me 'xplain now, 'cept what is to be will be ef it doesn't come to pass in years, en ef 'tis writ down agin yer, yer can't 'scape it. An' now he's up yander 'n I'm jest as good as a d'serted wife, airnin' my own livin'."
I couldn't altogether fancy M'liss dressed up in an airy costume dancing. I had always thought her rather heavy footed.
Dan Hayne was one of the stars of the evening as well, and no one could have mistrusted as he and Peggy whirled round, and I sat between the chimney and the light stand knitting, that we three were marked out for a tragedy. Was it true what M'liss had said—"That what is to be will be?"