Thus calmly and monotonously passed life on and around the island; its passage marked that year by only two important events.
The first was the retirement of Colonel Compton from political life (dismissed the public service by the new President, Thomas Jefferson), followed by the breaking up of his establishment at Richmond and the removal to Northumberland County, where the colonel and his wife took up their abode with their daughter and son-in-law at Buzzard’s Bluff. This event broke off the intimate connection between them and the bustling world they had left, though for a few weeks of every winter Nellie went to visit her friends in the city, and for a month or two, every summer, received and entertained them at Buzzard’s Bluff. Nellie declared that without this variety she should go melancholy mad; and at the same time wondered how Marguerite—the beautiful and brilliant Marguerite—would endure the isolation and monotony of her life on the island.
The other important occurrence was the accouchement of Mrs. Helmstedt, that took place early in October, when she became the mother of a lovely little girl. The sex of this child was a serious disappointment to Mr. Helmstedt, who had quite set his heart upon a son and heir, and who could scarcely conceal his vexation from the penetrating, beseeching eyes of his unhappy wife.
Mrs. Compton came and passed six weeks with the invalid, nursing her with the same maternal care that, in like circumstances, she would have bestowed upon her own daughter Nellie, and often repeating, cheerfully:
“When Marguerite gets well we shall have her out among us again,” or other hopeful words to the same effect.
But Marguerite was never again quite well. Brighter and brighter, month after month, burned in her sunken cheeks and mournful eyes the secret fire that was consuming her frame.
CHAPTER VII.
THE VISITOR.
“Speak, speak, thou fearful guest!”
—Longfellow.
“I could a tale unfold whose lightest word