The young man bent his head almost to her ear, as he whispered: "And there is no reason under heaven why your daughter's face should wear it. There is a curse in a false ambition like the one that is blackening your soul. Unbend yourself and do what every mother's heart should prompt her to do. Seek your child's happiness and despise, as every noble character will, the worldly lust that is governing you."
"How dare you!" she exclaimed, rising to her feet and fixing her keen eyes upon him. But she said no more. The power of his calm, unflinching gaze awed her into silence, and turning she left the room. Yet the slumbering demon in her heart had been aroused and as she strolled out into the open air seemed ready to overpower her.
"What does he know about my false ambition? Could she have told him? Ah, but she knew nothing of her child; let her revelations be what they may, this secret is not his to taunt me with. Lost, lost! Poverty is to crush my pride after all I have done. 'A curse!' Yes, a curse has already set its seal upon my ambition—my life." She walked on until calm once more stole in among her the contending spirits, and she returned to the house.
"Mrs. Belmont seems like one who has experienced some great reverse," remarked Mrs. Gaylord, after her abrupt departure from the parlor. "I have noticed several times since she has been here a disquietude perfectly unaccountable in one of her position."
The young man made a casual reply, and others entering at the moment the little incident was seemingly forgotten.
"It has been decided," remarked Ellen to her brother the next morning; "Lily Gaylord will return with us, and Anna seems delighted. I had not thought until last evening that a tie of native land drew them together."
"A land of very favorable productions," replied the brother, with a mischievous smile.
During the short visit the war excitement was spreading wider and wider, and its symptoms became more and more positive. In the cities the alarm raged like an epidemic in certain circles, while there were a few who denounced the whole affair, a cooling draught quite inefficient to keep down the devouring fever. Great preparations were being made in Charleston, and a few other places were following its lead, so that, should the campaign really open in the spring, as was prophesied, they might be ready. Mr. St. Clair was one of the number who thought it not well to go to fighting. "To be sure," he would say, good-naturedly, "Uncle Sam is getting rather plethoric, and it may be well to give him a little fright," but he never would advocate the idea of the breaking up of households. "No doubt it would be a very fine thing to tumble down the old national structure after it was done we were sure of walking in over the ruins and building up to suit our own notions." But to tell the truth he was a little afraid of the old giant. He had learned that his locks might grow again, crop them ever so short. The safest way, he thought, was to let well enough alone.
His son was much of the same opinion, but if the house must be divided against itself he would not let it fall into ruin without a struggle. Therefore, in a few days after the little party had returned to the city, George St. Clair started for Charleston. Lily was in ecstacy as they drew near Savannah. The sea, the great glorious sea, was before her, and the music of its distant waves thrilled every fibre of her being. It recalled the fancied dream of her childhood when she longed to go out and lay her head on the billows and become a part of its restless life.
Charles Belmont, who had gone to the city a few days before, was at the St. Clair's on their arrival and gave them a hearty welcome. Had he thought that little Phebe, as the adopted daughter of the wealthy Virginia planter, would do to reign at Rosedale?