“A letter! How nice!” said Miss Letitia, looking towards the shelf. “John is as faithful in writing as if he were your lover.”
“He is the best lover a woman can have,” said Grace, as she busily sorted and arranged the flowers. “For my part, I ask nothing better than John.”
“Let me arrange for you, while you read your letter,” said Letitia, taking the flowers from her friend’s hands.
Miss Grace took down the letter from the mantelpiece, opened, and began to read it. Miss Letitia, meanwhile, watched her face, as we often carelessly watch the face of a person reading a letter.
Miss Grace was not technically handsome, but she had an interesting, kindly, sincere face; and her friend saw gradually a dark cloud rising over it, as one watches a shadow on a field.
When she had finished the letter, with a sudden movement she laid her head forward on the table among the flowers, and covered her face with her hands. She seemed not to remember that any one was present.
Letitia came up to her, and, laying her hand gently on hers, said, “What is it, dear?”
Miss Grace lifted her head, and said in a husky voice,—
“Nothing, only it is so sudden! John is engaged!”
“Engaged! to whom?”