“Yes; I know he did,” said Mrs. Carringford. “He was here to see Emily last night. He’s a nice boy.” There was emphasis in her way of making the statement. Harriet Blair had once remarked that Mrs. Carringford was that anomaly—a sane woman. Yet she opposed the visits of Austen Blair and spoke heartily concerning the other one. “Garrard is a nice boy; I like him.”
CHAPTER SIX
Alexina became twenty-one in May. She had found that in the settling of her affairs it would be necessary for her to remain in Louisville and so had written her mother to come to her there. She explained about the change in her life to the Carringfords, to find that they knew all about her mother; probably her little world, Georgy, Dr. Ransome, knew it, too, while these years she had comforted herself with the thought that, at least, it was her secret shame.
Mrs. Carringford put an arm about her and kissed her. There was approval in the action.
Emily looked at her, then laughed nervously, while a vivid scarlet rose to the roots of her chestnut hair.
As Alexina passed through the front-room study going home, the old minister glanced up from his writing and called her name. He pushed his spectacles back onto his leonine head, looking up as she came toward him. She was surprised, for he never had seemed conscious even of her comings and goings.
“There are two ties that are not of our making,” he told her; “the spiritual tie between the Creator and the created, and the material tie between the parent and the child. They are ties not of duty but of nature, as indestructible as matter. God go with you.”
She felt strange and choked, though she was not sure she knew what he meant.