Her confidence was very sweet.
"I'm going down to tea to-night. I was down at noon."
"Oh, you are improving. I hope there will come some warm weather and balmy airs."
"It was beautiful last spring. You know I never saw a real spring before."
She was bearing her loss and her sorrow beautifully. All day she had been thinking of the joy of those two when they met on the confines of that beautiful world. It made heaven seem so near, so real. Sometimes the tears came to her eyes. She was Cousin Chilian's little girl, so why should she feel lonely!
Once in a number of years spring comes early. It did this time, at the close of the century. People shook their heads and talked about "weather-breeders," and mentioned snow as late as May, when fruit trees had been in bloom. But nature had turned over a bright, clear leaf, that made the book of time fairly shine.
The carriage came and Cynthia was taken out. Miss Elizabeth wrapped her up like a mummy, and would put a brick, swathed in coverings, in the bottom for her feet. He had taken the ladies out occasionally, but of late years the sisters had been so busy they had little time for pleasure, they thought.
They crossed North Bridge and went up Danvers way. Oh, how lovely it was with the trees in baby leaf, and some wild things blossoming. And even then industry had planted itself. There on the farther bank of Waters River was the iron mill, where Dr. Nathan Read invented his scheme for cut nails. And he built a paddle-wheel steamboat that was a success before Robert Fulton tried his. And they passed the Page house, where General Gage had his office, and Madam Page had tea on the roof, because they had promised not to use tea in the house.
That amused Cynthia and he also told her of the woman, when tea first came to the country, who boiled the leaves and seasoned them, passing them around to her guests, who didn't think they were anything much in the vegetable line and too expensive ever to become general.
Birds sang about them, flocks of wild geese had started on their northward journey. What a wonderful world it was! And her father had been a boy here in Salem village, had lived in Cousin Chilian's house in the father's time, and her mother had been married in the stately parlor. Why, she could dream of their being real guests of the place. How odd she should come to live here. The life in India would be the dream presently.