CHAPTER XIV.
It seemed so strange the next day to look at Fan and think what had happened to her. I was glad to have it Sunday. The very church bells appeared to have caught a deeper tone, an awe and sacredness, a being set apart as it were from the ordinary uses. It was sweet and beautiful to me, and I was filled with a kind of quiet excitement, a great throbbing and trembling in every nerve, as if I stood on the threshold of a new life. Other girls had been engaged or had lovers, but it did not enter into my soul like this.
She was sweet and dreamy, saying very little. When she sang in Church her voice had a peculiar tremulousness in it, as if it swept through great waves of feeling. Mamma was very tender to her. When their eyes met it was with a mutual understanding made manifest in the simplest glance. I did not feel jealous. She and papa surely had the first right to the mystery and blessedness of the new relation. Papa watched her with wistful eyes, as if he could hardly resolve to relinquish her.
Thus two or three days passed. We were up in our room, I dusting, and Fan folding some clothes, and laying ribbons orderly in a pretty box.
“That is so lovely,” and she shook out a delicate blonde blue. “Mr. Duncan chose it for me. We went shopping one day with Mrs. Whitcomb, to buy some table linen. It was such fun! I told him he wasted his money in riotous living, the fine linen being a sure sign.”
Just then our heads met, mine going down and hers coming up. We laughed and looked at each other in great confusion.
“O Fan,” I said just under my breath.
“My dear old darling! I want to tell you—”
“I have guessed,” I said quickly with conscious color. “It is just right, you and Stephen will be so happy.”