Here Ernestine, who had lain motionless all the while, gave a quick sob, and shivered from head to foot, and bending down to kiss her tenderly, Mrs. Dering went on:
"She died with us, dear, in just a few days after, and with her last breath, gave you to me; and ever since I took you, a tiny, little babe from her arms, you have been just as dear to me as though God had sent you to me, my very own."
Ernestine was shivering violently, and as Mrs. Dering finished, hid her face deeper in the pillow with a pitiful heart-broken moan, that was hard to hear, and Mrs. Dering said softly:
"Here, darling, in this box are some things that were to belong to you, in case you ever knew the truth, though with her last breath, your mother besought us to keep it from you, if we could, and we have tried, that being one reason why we afterwards left Virginia for New York State. But God knows best; it is right for you to know, or it would not have been so. The ring in the box is the one given by Walter to your mother, and she wished you, if you ever knew the story, to wear it."
Some time after Mrs. Dering left the room, Ernestine slowly turned her head, looked at the box, and with trembling fingers lifted the cover. The first thing that met her eyes, was a picture, an exquisite face painted on porcelain, and she uttered a smothered cry as she looked at the face of her mother, of whom she was the living image. There was the same brown eyes, with their slender arches; the same fine straight nose, and wilful, determined mouth, and the same halo of sunny hair, covering the proud little head. But Ernestine, looking at it then, thought of the sweet, true, dear woman, she had always called mother, and threw it down with a bitter cry of pain. There was also a tiny note, written in a beautiful dashing hand, and after a while she read it slowly.
"Bess Darling:
"You have always been my good angel, and I could cry if I wasn't so happy, to think how I am going to disappoint you after all. But you mustn't mind, only think how happy I am going to be, for Clarence loves me! I will be his wife when you read this, and oh Bess I cannot help but be happy then. Tell Walter he must not care, he never would have been happy with me, because I could not love him. I hope you will not feel badly when you get this; have a gay wedding, and think how happy I am. I expect it is wrong to run off this way, but I've always done things wrong, I always will, but it might have been different, if my mother had loved home more, society less, and been as true and good to me as a mother, as you have been as a friend.
"FLORENCE."
There were many little trinkets, beside the diamond ring, which Ernestine declared she could never wear; and in a tiny little box, with "My Baby," written on the top, were four round bits of gold, each a five dollar piece.
It really seemed as though the girls could never recover from the shock. Their faces were pale and tear-stained for many days; and only Olive, whose self-control was greatest, could venture into Ernestine's presence, without bursting into tears, and having to beat a hasty retreat. Every fault that she had ever possessed, they lost sight of now; they only thought how they all loved her, how happy and sweet she had always been about home, how lovely she was, and how dreadful it would be if they were to lose her. For Mrs. Dering had told them some things that she had not told Ernestine, among them these: