A few minutes later they were tête-à-tête at the little table, and as they sat down Grace said with a comical smile: "Quite a difference between our banquet of last night and this, isn't there?"
"I should remark there is, but after all, Grace, I believe I am quite content. As I was passing along at the foot of the hill this evening a momentary dissatisfaction came over me that I couldn't have a few advantages like Mrs. Hayden's, not hers of course, but similar ones," with a smile at the distinction, "and then I wondered how she spends all her leisure, for of course she has the whole twenty-four hours at her disposal, and—well, to be brief, I would not want to live without some object in life, and so I thought it best the way it is now."
"Very wise conclusion, Kate, that's just what I always say, and really who is there with whom we would care to exchange places? There are so many kinds of people and so many things for humanity to contend against, I don't know that I should want to change burdens with anyone."
"Mrs. Dyke, for instance, would you not think yourself fortunate to be like her?" said Kate, with a merry twinkle in her eyes.
"Oh, deliver me from that comparison! Why, she carries everybody's sins on her shoulders; I even heard she had taken Robert Elsmere to throw at the world!" laughed Grace.
"But not his wife; she didn't read about her. Wasn't it too funny to hear her go on last night, and the way she looked at the minister to emphasize her position?"
"Yes, but how many there are like her—read just enough to know there are such and such characters and such and such incidents. Now of course she has heard the minister define Robert's crime, as he would call it I suppose, so she thinks she can use the whole argument," replied Grace, a little scornfully.
"Mrs. Hayden interposed just at the right time. I was glad she did, too. It seems she has considered Catherine's position and could speak a good word for her," said Kate, sipping her tea, thoughtfully.
"Well, if she calls her an ideal of wifely love, I don't admire the reality," exclaimed Grace, with more vigor than elegance, as she put down her tea-cup.
"I got positively impatient," she continued, "when I read about her cruelty to Robert, judging him in that inquisitor's fashion. Poor fellow! I think he died of a broken heart."