The cousins were sitting at needlework when she entered—Julia’s tasteful fingers devising new trimmings for one of the pretty Parisian costumes so becoming to her fine figure, while Susan was altering one of her gray merinos for an orphan girl in whom she was interested.
They both arose, uttering expressions of concern, when they saw the jaded looks of their visitor.
“Something has happened!” cried Julia, with a startled air. “Something terrible! What is it—what is it?”
“Give her time to recover herself,” interposed her more considerate cousin. “Sit down, dear Miss Heriton, and let me unfasten your cloak.”
But Julia, as if goaded by some fear that made patient waiting an impossibility, put her aside, and, throwing herself on her knees beside the silent Florence, seized her cold hands in her own feverish palms.
“Speak at once, Miss Heriton! Let us know the worst! You have been out—you have heard tidings which concern us—me—as well as yourself, else you would not be here!”
“I am more selfish than you imagine,” was the reply. “I came to Susan, because I am in great distress. I hope—ah, I hope it is a trouble which will not affect you.”
But there was a doubt and a question in Florence’s unsteady accents, and Julia felt it.
“Tell me where you have been and what you have heard,” she said, so imperiously that Susan, with a look of grave reproof, touched her shoulder.
“I have been to the Albany—to Lieutenant Mason’s chambers.”