"Have you no regrets when you think of strangers possessing the little family burying ground where some of your ancestors long ago crumbled to dust?"
Eglah lifted her hand to brush away an orange petal that drifted down to the velvet collar of his coat, and Eliza knew that the perpendicular line between her brows indexed profound dissatisfaction.
"Regrets are unprofitable, and what remains of my life must pay dividends. My dear, will you kindly hand me my match box?"
"Then you are homeless?"
Smiling blandly, he bowed to her.
"I trust not, while my daughter owns thousands of acres of the finest land in the South."
"Do you forget how often you have declared you would never again live south of Washington?"
"I forget nothing, but circumstances are not as fixed as parallels of latitude, and changed conditions demand readjustment of plans. Irrevocability travelled into limbo with ancient Medes and Persians, and after the first of May I hope I may count upon the traditional hospitality of Nutwood. You are of age, and have the right to occupy it."
Slowly but steadily the barrier between father and child had risen and strengthened since the visit to Greyledge—a wall as of crystal, which she could neither level nor penetrate. Close to him, having him apparently within touch, yet conscious always that a transparent obstacle divided them. To the cause of estrangement he never referred, even indirectly, and he was neither irritable nor stern, but mercilessly cold and punctiliously courteous. Why he had selected Taormina in preference to Palermo was known only to himself, but one morning Eliza and Eglah saw a letter postmarked Catania, and both recognized Mr. Herriott's peculiarly bold handwriting. Judge Kent read it, returned it to the envelope, which he put in his pocket, and unfolded a New York newspaper. Mrs. Mitchell moved away to a distant window, carrying her embroidery frame and silks, and Eglah opened the piano and played softly two of Chopin's nocturnes. In the mirror opposite she saw that her father was listening, beating time with the index finger of his right hand. When she ended and approached him, he shut his eyes and hummed the final bars.
"Father, why did you come here for so long a stay?"