Zaidee had been waiting for Aunt Kate to come up stairs, as the last caller had gone. She was lonely after this long communing with herself.
“If there is not one for me I shall go to bed and cry,” she declared as she followed to her mother’s room. Aunt Kate had been detailing some of the pleasant neighborhood news.
Yes—each one was directed. Willard had not omitted one member of the household. He was in Washington and had come just in time for some of the grand occasions. Saturday he was to board his vessel and by Wednesday, at the farthest, they were to start on their three years’ pilgrimage. But to each one some tenderness exclusively for herself. To Zay he recalled many of their joys during the summer time, little events they were glad to hold together and the blessed news of their mother.
“There will never be anything quite like that,” she thought to herself. “And there is no one else—Aunt Kate never felt afraid to trust us, and of course, he will grow older, find a sweetheart perhaps, and I may have a lover; girls of nineteen do. Up to this time he has cared the most for me.”
Marguerite turned to the window though the gas had been lighted. There was no past to refer to, only the sweet, tender hopes of the future. It touched her deeply. No one had ever written her such a letter before. And that he was her brother and would write again and again. She must strive to deserve this love and confidence, grow up into the fine character he had pictured for her. Vincent had sent her fond messages in his mother’s letter but she did not know him and he could not come so near.
Zay read some of hers aloud, but she wondered a little what he could find to say so much of to Marguerite. She had not the courage to show it to her mother, even, it seemed so sacred to her. Oh, could she reach the heights he had indicated?
Marguerite did shrink from the ordeal of Saturday evening. She had kept rigorously to the position of Mrs. Boyd’s daughter but how would she meet these girls who had held aloof in her poverty and proffered cordiality now, because she was Major Crawford’s daughter! She could not get over a little hurt feeling, for surely she was the same person. She almost despised the money and the position. But there was the grand and tender love. Ah, that was worth a great deal.
By Saturday noon all the girls had come in. There were merry greetings, recapitulations of the holiday times and the gifts they had received and some of them heard for the first time the change in Lilian Boyd’s life.
“I always liked her,” said Isabel Gordon, “only you couldn’t get on with her. She allowed you to come so far and no farther. And she was a most excellent student and very ready to help anyone. I don’t think you girls need ever felt afraid of her presuming and now I suppose you will all go down to her.”
Miss Gordon’s voice had a touch of indignation.