"I said flaxseed tea, my dear. I am almost seventy years old, and I have treated three hundred servants and seen sixty laid in their graves, but if you think you are a better doctor than I am, of course there's nothing to be said. Docia, hold the yarn a little tighter."
"We'll make the flaxseed tea at once, and I'll carry it right over—a breath of air will do me good."
Mrs. Blake sighed. "You mustn't stay too closely with me," she said; "you will grow old before your time, I fear. As it is you have given up your young life to my poor old one."
"I had nothing to give up, mother," replied Cynthia quietly, and in the few words her heart's tragedy was written—since of all lives, the saddest is the one that can find nothing worthy of renouncement. There were hours when she felt that any bitter personal past—that the recollection of a single despairing kiss or a blighted love would have filled her days with happiness. What she craved was the conscious dignity of a broken heart—some lofty memory that she might rest upon in her hours of weakness.
"Well, you might have had, my child," returned her mother.
Cynthia's only answer was to smooth gently the pillows in the old lady's chair. "If you could learn to lean back, dearest, it would rest you so," she said.
"I have never slouched in my life," replied Mrs. Blake decisively, "and I do not care to fall into the habit in my seventieth year. When my last hour comes, I hope at least to meet my God in the attitude becoming a lady, and in my day it would have been considered the height of impropriety to loll in a chair or even to rock in the presence of gentlemen. Your Greataunt Susannah, one of the most modest women of her time, has often told me that once, having unfortunately crossed her knees in the parlour after supper, she suffered untold tortures from "budges" for three mortal hours rather than be seen to do anything so indelicate as to uncross them. Well, well, ladies were ladies in those days, and now Lila tells me it is quite customary for them to sit like men. My blindness has spared me many painful sights, I haven't a doubt."
"Things have changed, dear. I wish they hadn't. I liked the old days, too."
"I'm glad at least to hear you say so. Your Aunt Susannah—and she was the one who danced a minuet with General Lafayette, you know—used to say that patience and humility became a gentlewoman better than satin and fine lace. She was a lady of fashion and a great beauty, so I suppose her opinion counts for something— especially as she was noted for being the proudest woman of her day, and it was said that she never danced with a gentleman who hadn't fought a duel on her account. When she went to a ball it took six small darkies to carry her train, and her escort was always obliged to ride on top of the coach to keep from rumpling the flounces of her petticoat. They always said that I had inherited something of her face and step."
"I'm sure she was never so beautiful as you, mother."