“I wasn’t counting on your father’s bearing the expense, nor you either,” said Miss Saxon, dryly. “I guess I could afford to do that much for you, and a few other things too, if you took a notion to ’em.” And then a tenderer note crept into her voice as she added, “I missed most of the things I wanted when I was a girl, and I’d like to make sure of it that you fared better.”
There was no talking for a minute or two after that. The delights that seemed to open before Esther through the avenues of this plan almost took her breath away, and the generosity that proposed it made her eyes dim with tears. It was Aunt Katharine, not she, who could discuss it coolly, and to the old woman the thought seemed to grow every moment dearer. There were friends of hers in Boston—not Stella’s friends, she added, with a peculiar smile—people who would be good to Esther for her sake. Perhaps Esther would come to feel toward them as she herself did, and then she looked at the girl for a moment as if taking her measure with reference to something larger than she knew.
The dew was falling and the whippoorwills were calling across the hills through the twilight that had deepened almost into night when Esther rose at last to go home. She had never kissed Aunt Katharine before, but the old woman drew her face down to hers and held it for an instant as she bade her good night. Then she said almost brusquely:—
“You’d better hurry home now. They’ll think I’ve lost my wits entirely to be keeping you so long. And you’ve got that letter to write to your mother. Tell her everything, and be sure it goes in the morning.”
And Esther, with feet almost as light as the wings of the night birds, hurried across the fields to tell the surprising news to the two circles—the household at home, and the one at her grandfather’s.
[CHAPTER XII—WHEN GREEK MEETS GREEK]
It was a long letter that went to Mrs. Northmore the next morning. Indeed, there were three; for Stella, in her delight over the prospect of keeping Esther, filled a sheet with an ecstatic picture of the joys which a winter in Boston would surely furnish, and Ruel Saxon supplied another, impressing upon his daughter his own deep satisfaction in the thought of having one of her children with him a little longer, and adding tenderly that since she herself went out of the home so long ago, no young presence there had been as dear and comforting to him as this of Esther.
He had been amazed when the girl brought the news of Aunt Katharine’s proposal, and certainly nothing in his sister’s behavior for years had pleased him as much. He visited her promptly the next morning to assure her of his approval, and congratulate her (as he told Aunt Elsie) on having for once acted with such eminent good sense. But either he did not do it in the most tactful manner, or he found his sister in an unfortunate mood, for it appeared from his own account of it that, after the brightest preliminaries, she had proceeded to air her most obnoxious views; views which, as he pensively declared, he had smitten hip and thigh and put utterly to rout more than once; and he ended his report of the interview with an expression of irritated wonder as to how so amiable a girl as Esther Northmore ever came to be a favorite with her Aunt Katharine Saxon.
But there was one person who found it even harder than he to understand the partiality. This was Kate; and in her the wonder was mingled with a sort of resentment which she could not throw off. She alone of the household had not rejoiced when her sister came in that night with the announcement of the invitation which seemed to her such great good fortune. There was no touch of envy in it. To the exclamation of all, “If Kate could only stay, too!” she had responded with perfect honesty, “I don’t want to. I’ve had a splendid time here; but I’m about ready to go home now, and I wouldn’t stay away longer than we planned if I could.”
It was none of her business perhaps,—she said it to herself again and again,—but she did not like the growing influence which Aunt Katharine was gaining over Esther. It did not matter so much while the intimacy was thought to be only passing, and going home lay in the near distance, but to leave her sister behind, within touch of this masterful spirit, and all the more open to her influence through receiving her favors, this was a prospect before which Kate chafed with a growing uneasiness. That thing which Tom had told her so long ago, which had only amused her then, that Aunt Katharine had said she would leave her money to that one of her female relatives who would promise never to marry, came back to her now to vex and trouble her. That the woman would definitely make so bald a proposal, or that the girl would definitely accept it, were suggestions which at moments seemed too foolish to entertain; she could brush them aside with scorn; and then, in some new form, they would come creeping back. If not a definite proposal, a formal promise, there might be tacit understanding, something which would rest upon the girl and bind her as subtly as any pledge. Poor Kate! She could not even understand her own state of mind. Was it love of Esther? Was it thought of Morton Elwell, and a haunting sense of a hope which she felt sure he carried deep in his heart? Or was it simply the revolt of a spirit as stout as Aunt Katharine’s own against the possibility of any bondage, for her sister as for herself?