IN THE VIRGINIA ROOM
“Childless,” was the word which she murmured in her heart, as she entered the building which had once been the Presidential Mansion of Jefferson Davis and now is the Confederate Museum. Why the thought of her estranged daughter flashed upon her as she came to do honor to the memory of her long dead husband, Mrs. Desborough could not have told, but so overwhelming was the sadness of her mood that she could hardly wonder if this bitter memory took advantage of her moment of weakness to obtrude itself. She set her lips tightly and put it determinedly into the background. She would not think of the daughter who was lost to her; to-day and here no thought but should go back in loving homage and passionate grief to the hero whose name she bore.
She went at once to the Virginia Room, bowing quickly but kindly to the custodian of the Museum, and as she pushed open the door of the sad place, she thought herself alone. The heavy April rain which was drenching Richmond outside kept visitors away, and the building was almost deserted. In her yearly visits to this spot, those pilgrimages which she had made as to a shrine, she had once before had the Virginia Room to herself, untroubled by the presence of strangers; and now with a quick sigh of relief she realized how great had been the comfort of that solitude. To her sensitive nature it was hard to stand before the memorials of her dead and yet to be aware that strange eyes, eyes curious if sympathetic, might be reading in her face all the emotions of her very soul. To preserve the calm necessary before the public had always seemed to her almost like being untrue to the memory she came to consecrate; and to-day it was with a swelling sigh of relief that she threw back her heavy widow’s veil with the free, proud motion which belonged to the women of her race and time—the women bred in the South before the war. She was an old woman, though not much over sixty, for pain can age more swiftly than time. The high-bred mien would be hers as long as life remained, and wonderful was her self-control. Again and again she had felt unshed tears burn in her eyes like living fire, yet had been sure that no stranger had had reason to look upon her as more than a casual visitor to the museum; but to be able to let her grief have way seemed almost a joy. She felt the quick drops start at the bare thought. Life had left her no greater blessing than this liberty to weep undiscovered over the memorials of her dead.
At the instant a man came from behind one of the cases, so near that she might have touched him. Instinctively she tried to take her handkerchief from her chatelaine, and in her confusion detached the bag. It fell at the feet of the gentleman, who stooped at once to pick it up. As he held it out, she forced a smile to her fine old face.
“Thank you,” she said; “I—I was very awkward.”
“Not at all,” he responded. “Those bags are so easily unhooked.”
The tone struck her almost like a blow. To the disappointment of finding that she was not alone in this solemn place was added the bitter fact that the intruder who had come upon her was not of her people. An impulse of bitterness from the old times of blood and of fire swept over her like a wave. The room had carried her back as it always did to the past, and after almost two-score years she for the first time broke through the stern resolve that had kept her from hostile speech.
“You are a Northerner!” she exclaimed.