Julia's heart beat quick; she could not bear to see that strange, beautiful woman depart without speaking to her again.
"Lady, will you take this one little bunch?—some people love violets better than anything!"
"No, no, I cannot—I——" The lady paused, tears seemed choking her. She drew down the folds of a rich blonde veil over her face, and moved on.
Julia laid the violets back into her basket with a sigh. Feelings of vague disappointment were saddening her heart. When she looked up again, the lady had taken her seat in the carriage, and leaning out was beckoning to her.
"I will take the violets!" she said, reaching forth her hand, that trembled as the simple blossoms were placed in it.—"Heaven forbid that I should cast the sweet omen from me. Thank you child—thank you."
The lady drew back into the carriage. Her face was clouded by the veil, but tears trembled in her voice, and that voice lingered upon Julia Warren's ear many a long month afterward. It had unlocked the deepest well-spring of her life.
The strawberry girl stood upon the wharf motionless and lost in thought minutes after the carriage drove away. She had forgotten the basket on her arm, everything in the strange regret that lay upon her young heart. Never, never would she meet that beautiful woman again. The thought filled her soul with unutterable loneliness. She was unconscious that another carriage had driven up, and that a Southern vessel, arrived that morning, was pouring forth luggage and passengers on the opposite side of the pier. She took no heed of anything that was passing around her, till a sweet, low voice close by, exclaimed—
"Oh! see those flowers—those beautiful, beautiful moss rose-buds!"
Julia looked up. A young girl with soft, dark eyes, and lips dewy and red as the buds she coveted, stood a few paces off, with her hand grasped by a tall and stately looking man, approaching middle age, if not a year or two on the other side, who seemed anxious to hurry his companion into the carriage.
"Step in, Florence, the girl can come to us!" said the man, restraining the eager girl, who had withdrawn her foot from the carriage steps. "Come, come, lady-bird, this is no place for us: see, half the crowd are looking this way."