CHAPTER XVI.
WARBLINGS IN THE WHITE HOUSE AND SNARES FOR A SOUL.
Achsah Claghorn, for many years lonely, with maternal instincts steadily suppressed, had found the first opportunity of a long life to gratify cravings of which she had been until now unconscious. Coyly, even with trembling, she sought the love of her grand-niece, being herself astonished, as much as she astonished others, by an indulgent tenderness seemingly foreign to her character. Grandmothers, though once severe as mothers, are often overfond in their last maternal role, and it may be that Miss Claghorn pleased herself by the fiction of a relationship which, though not actually existent, had some foundation in long-past conditions.
"Did your father never speak of me?" she asked.
"Often, Aunt. Especially of late years, after we had met Cousin Jared."
"But not with much affection?"
Natalie was somewhat at a loss. "He said you were his second mother," was her reply.
"Poor Susan—that was your grandmother, my dear. She was a gentle, loving creature. I think now, though perhaps I did not at the time, that 'Liph was lonely after she died. Ours was a dull house," she continued, after a pause. "Your grandfather lived more in heaven than on earth, which made it gloomy for us that didn't. Saints are not comfortable to live with, and 'Liph was often in disgrace. I hope I was never hard to a motherless boy, but—but——"
"I am sure you were not. My father never said so."