Just as the sun began to turn its silver gleams into gold, the music ceased with a grand crash. The final melody was over, and the swarm of carriages broke up, whirled off in different directions, and began to course about the ring again, or drive through the various outlets towards Harlem, Bloomingdale, or the city, which lay in the soft gathering haze of the distance.
Among the stylish equipages that disentangled themselves from the crowd was a light barouche, cushioned with a rich shade of drab which had a pink flush running through it, and drawn by a pair of jet-black horses. The carriage was so perfect in its proportions and so exquisitely neat in its appointments, that it would have been an object of general admiration during the whole concert, had not its inmates carried off public attention before it had time to settle on the vehicle.
The eldest, a woman of thirty-two or three, elegantly dressed and generally recognized, seemed to be the mistress, for it was her gloved hand which gave the signal for moving, and the coachman always looked to her for directions.
A slight gesture indicated home, the moment she saw her equipage free from the crowd, but the lovely young creature on the front seat uttered a merry protest and gave a laughing counter-order, threatening the elder lady with her half-closed parasol, till the point lace which covered it fluttered like the fringed leaves of a great white-hearted poppy.
"Only a short drive," she said; "you can't want to go into the house, dear Mrs. Harrington, such a heavenly day as this."
"But, my love, I have forty things to do!"
"All the more reason why you should neglect every one of them, since it is not possible for you to do them all," replied the young girl, with a laugh and a pretty wilful air that few people could have resisted. "Elizabeth, are you tired?"
The young lady whom she addressed had been leaning back in her seat by Mrs. Harrington, quite regardless of this laughing contention, looking straight before her in a smiling, dreamy way, which proved that the brightness of the scene and the spell of the music had wiled her into some deep and pleasant train of thought.
Her friend spoke twice before she heard, laughing gayly at her abstraction, and Mrs. Harrington added—
"Do come out of dreamland, dear Miss Fuller; I am sure I cannot manage this wilful little thing without your help."