She brushed the rose leaves from her lap, and placed the bouquet she had arranged in the basket of a Parian marble porter on the mantel; then coming back to mother, she kneeled down by her side, and laying her cheek sideways on mother’s knee, with that peculiar winning way of her’s, said softly:
“I hope Col. Smith will be able to save me something to repay you all for your goodness to me, for I cannot stay under your roof as a charity outcast, and it would kill me to leave you now, I have learned to love you so.”
“My dear child,” said mother, laying her hand on her soft, dark hair, “the very idea of compensating us for the greatest pleasure of our lives! Colonel Smith has gone to Havana solely on your account. Thank heaven we have as much as we want, and you may feel that you have a daughter’s place in our household, and will never, never be a burden. Who knows,” she added, playfully patting her head and glancing toward my couch, “but what you may be a daughter, indeed, to us one of these days.”
“Oh, Mrs. Smith,” said Carlotta so earnestly, that I opened my eyes in time to see the scarlet tinge of her cheeks, “you do not know how you hurt me when you say that. ‘Twould make me hate the very thought of your son, whom I now esteem so much, to think that I was taken into your family to please him; that I was being raised to suit his fancy; that my character was being moulded after his model of a woman; that it was being constantly said of me, as I have heard it said: ‘Mrs. Smith is training her up for her son.’ Will I not shrink from his very presence when I feel that he looks upon me as his to love or not, just as he likes?”
“My dear child,” said mother, looking surprised, “my words were almost without meaning. Forgive me, and I will endeavor to prevent any allusion, in this house at least, that may wound your feelings.”
I here turned over, and moving my arms about showed signs of waking. This put an end to the conversation. Mother coming to the couch found me with considerable fever, and becoming alarmed sent Reuben off after the doctor. In truth I did feel a little badly, though I had been so interested in the conversation that I had not thought of my feelings. My eyeballs were hot and red, and felt as if they were full of sand; my breath burnt my nostrils as it came out, and my tongue was dry and coated. An hour of feverish restlessness elapsed before we heard the doctor’s horse plodding up the avenue in a slow jog-trot, the fastest speed known to the medical fraternity. The doctor himself was equally deliberate in tying him to the rack, crossing the stirrups over the back of the saddle with the utmost care, and finally marching up the steps as if he was a pall-bearer at a funeral. He laid his hat on the seat in the porch, put his gloves in the crown, and laid his riding switch across them, as if it was to guard them. He at length advanced into the house and met mother.
“How d’ye do, madam; a very warm day, madam,” he said, shaking her hand with one of his, and rubbing the bald place on his head with the other, as if all the heat of the day had centred there.
“It is very sultry indeed, sir,” replied mother, as he released her hand. “Reuben, hand a glass of water, or perhaps, sir, you would prefer wine?”
“Much obliged, madam, but water will do. Best for this weather, madam.”
While the water was being brought he sat down near the door and waited patiently, without deigning to notice me, as if anything connected with his profession was farthest from his thoughts.