Eva left the room and then Ross saw that his sister was crying bitterly.
“What is the matter! Why are you distressed?” he asked.
“Oh! I loved her so! She was like my own child. Now—now that other woman will take her from me.”
“That she never will! Elizabeth understands too well all that you have done for her child.”
“After all,” said the kind woman, brightening up like a child, “she is my niece, and that is something.”
“Besides, you forget that Elizabeth is your sister,” said Ross.
“Mrs. Lambert my sister—mine! How strange it seems—such a beautiful, lovely lady.”
Before Eva came down stairs, Mrs. Carter had begun to console herself; after all, it was something to have a niece like Eva, and a sister-in-law who had been for years a leader in society.
Mrs. Lambert was indeed waiting with passionate impatience for a sight of her child. The flood of her own happiness fairly transfigured the woman. Her pride was all swept away; the calm force of her character had disappeared with the secret that she had guarded so well. She walked the room; she flung herself on the couch and wept the sweetest tears that had ever visited her eyes. She went to the window and looked longingly out.
Would they never come? surely, surely more than an hour had passed.