A Woman of Yesterday

by Caroline Atwater Mason

Keith looked down at the straight fashionlessness of Anna’s black figure with unconcealed concern.

“I ought to have thought,” he said, “but it never occurred to me about your clothes. We must get you a whole lot of new things straight away, dear. We will do it together, and have a great time over it, won’t we? And you will put off the black now for my sake? I want to see you in wine-red silk and good lace.”

“Oh, Keith!” cried Anna, “I cannot imagine myself masquerading like that. It would never do. But for to-night—that is the trouble now.”

“Why, wear your wedding-gown, sweetheart; that is just the thing. What luck that we did get that!” and Keith was down on his knees before the trunk on the instant, and soon produced the dress which, being of fine white cashmere, with a little lace about the neck, was, in fact, altogether appropriate.

Anna looked puzzled. It seemed to her almost sacrilegious to put on that dress for everyday use, and the association with it made her shiver, even now, but she did not dispute the matter.

Just before six o’clock Keith ushered his wife into the library downstairs, where his mother sat waiting to receive them. It was the sort of a library which Anna had read of but had not seen—lined with books, furnished with massive leather-covered chairs and darkly gleaming mahogany, a dim old India carpet on the floor.

Anna saw by the shaded drop-light the form of a small woman of fragile figure, dressed in silver-grey silk, with a white shawl of cobweb fineness of texture about her shoulders. There were several good diamonds at her throat and on her hands, her grey hair was beautifully dressed in soft waves and fastened with a quaint silver comb of fine workmanship. Her face was pale and the features delicately cut; her movement as she advanced to meet Anna was slow, and, in spite of her diminutive size, stately, and there was a crisp, frosty rustle of her grey gown.

She took both Anna’s hands in hers with a cold, kind smile, and kissed her twice on her forehead, Anna bending low for the purpose. She seemed to be at an incalculable height above the fine little lady, and singularly young and immature. At twenty-two she had felt herself a woman for long years, with her sober cares and grave purposes; but to-night, before Keith’s mother, she suddenly seemed to become a shy, undeveloped girl again.

While they spoke a little of the journey and the night, Keith Burgess turned on his heel and affected to be examining, with critical interest, an engraving above the fireplace, which he had seen in the same spot all his life; but he was watching them both aside narrowly as he stood. He was perfectly satisfied.

If Anna had been never so much prettier, and possessed of all of Mally Loveland’s confident social facility; if she had met his mother as the country girl of this type would have done, with eager and affectionate appeal that she should at once stand and deliver motherly sympathy and affection in copious measure,—there would have been only disappointment and chagrin. But Mrs. Burgess’s bearing was not more reserved than that of her daughter-in-law. At twenty-two Anna’s grave repose of manner was in itself a distinction, and one which had its full weight with the elder woman. Plainly, she had not a gushing provincial beauty on her hands to curb and fashion into form. As for good looks, there was a certain angular grace already in figure, an unconscious dignity of attitude and bearing which suited Keith’s mother, while for her face, the eyes were good, the brow very noble, and the expression peculiarly lofty. The succession of strong and sudden emotional experiences through which Anna had recently passed had wrought a subtle change already in her face; there was less severity, less of hard, conscientious rigour in its lines; a certain transparent, spiritual illumination softened the profound sadness which was her habitual expression.