"Why not wait for Father? Perhaps he can persuade her."
"For two months, darling?"
"If no better thing can be done."
The mother smiled. "Perhaps you are correct. This may be best. I think we will wait."
CHAPTER XL.
AUNT VINA IN THE NEW HOME.
The weeks succeeding the incidents of our last chapter sped rapidly by. Winter came with its chilling winds, rifling the waving branches of their many colors, leaving them bare and unsightly; while it spread now and then over the seared lawns a pure white covering of snow, to hide for a time its sad work; and upon all this Mrs. Belmont looked with dreamy listlessness from her window. What was beauty, death, or change to her now, shut out as she was from the past, and in fear of the future? When kind hearts attempted to gain her consent to have the monotony of life broken she would plead: "No, no, let me stay here! It is cold, I cannot go! Lillian, my child, don't let her come! She will look at me with her large eyes, so much like my baby's! It would kill me!"