After a few careless words, Miss Chase went up to her room, and as she passed down stairs ready to go, opened the door of the breakfast-room, where Margaret sat in the same dreary solitude.
"Have you any other commands?" she asked, pleasantly.
"None, thank you; what a fine day you will have."
"Oh, lovely; good-morning."
Margaret returned this farewell, and Miss Chase took her departure.
There the unhappy girl remained, and let the hours float on while she gave herself up to a thousand bitter reflections. The bright spring morning had no charm for Margaret, the merry carols of the birds upon the lawn had lost their sweetness to her ear; she could only gaze upon the dark shadows of her life, and mark how, day by day, it drifted into deeper gloom. Her strength seemed to fail daily, and that of itself would have been sorrow enough for one of her age; but she had sterner troubles still.
How the promise of her girlhood had cheated her! The affection which she had believed was to brighten all coming years, was rapidly fading from her life.
Let it go! She would make no effort to recover either the hopes or the love that she had lost. Laurence might take his own course; she would not try to recall his wandering fancies. She believed that her heart was strong enough to despise his love if again offered. There Margaret made the mistake which all young persons fall into when the proud, untried heart falls into its first love-sorrow.
While Margaret indulged in that mournful revery, Sybil Chase was on her way to the city, smiling and pleasant, affable to every one that came in her way; even the servant, who drove her over to the station, thought to himself what a different lady she was from his silent, haughty mistress; and the farmers who rented portions of Mr. Waring's estate, and among whom she had made herself a very popular person, smiled pleasantly as she rode by.
Cheerful and handsome she looked, sitting in the train, and being whirled rapidly along the pretty route on her way to town. She reached the city even earlier than she anticipated, and went about her errands at once, with her accustomed straightforwardness. Nothing was forgotten. Margaret's indifferent message was punctually fulfilled, and in a manner which must have satisfied a much more difficult person than Margaret.