"Ah! I daresay," sighed Mrs. Pryor; "some Papist's place."
"Well, this young person told me," said Ruth, taking no notice of the interruption, "that at their hotel it was just like an English country house; everything goes like clock-work. In your lady's days, I daresay, sixty years ago, it might have been changed."
"Yes, it was different. And times are changed," said Mrs. Pryor. "The young set themselves up, and think it fine to scoff at their elders. If this pretty child—for she is but a child—is laid in the burying-ground out there, hundreds of miles from her widowed mother, don't come to me to be surprised—that's all."
Ruth nodded at Stevens to say no more. But Stevens's own heart was heavy; and many were the sighs which were breathed over Ada's box, which stood ready, strapped and addressed, in the dull haze of the November morning.
Ada herself had kept up bravely till now; but as the wheels of the fly were heard which was to take her to the station, to meet Lady Monroe and Eva and their maid, her sobs broke forth.
"Oh, I wish I were not going!" she said. "O mother, mother!"
"Don't upset mamma, Ada," Salome whispered. "Dear Ada, please don't."
But Ada threw herself into her mother's arms, and could only sob out, "Oh, I wish I were not going!"
Mrs. Wilton strove to be calm; and Stevens wisely hastened box, and neat little bundle of rugs, and ulster, and umbrella into the fly. Hans and Carl, who, with Stevens, were to see Ada off, stood bewildered to see their generally calm, self-possessed sister crying so bitterly.
"I thought she wanted to go to France," Carl said, puckering up his mouth.