She suffered a temporary relapse later on, when her aunt, in fulfilment of her promise, came up to the mansion for a short call. Reliance, however, was bright and cheerful, never showed, nor permitted her to show, the least trace of tears or loneliness, exclaimed at the size and beauty of the pink room, chatted of matters at the post office and millinery shop, promised to come again just as soon as she could, and hurried away in a bustle of good-humored energy. She had gone before Esther could realize that their meeting was but temporary, not the resumption of the old close, everyday companionship.
The girl accompanied her to the door, but Foster Townsend was waiting at the gate.
“Well, how has it gone?” asked Reliance.
“All right enough, so far,” was the curt answer. “I guess we’ll get along, after we get used to it.”
Miss Clark nodded. “She’ll get along, I know,” she said. “She’s young and young folks forget the old and take up with the new pretty easy—especially such a ‘new’ as this will be to her. She’ll get along; you are the one who will have to take time to get used to it. Let her have her own way once in a while, Foster. It will be good judgment in the end and save lots of trouble.”
He sniffed. “Seems to me we thrashed this all out yesterday,” he retorted. “I can handle a skittish colt as well as the next one, maybe.... Don’t you worry about our getting along.... How are you getting along—without her?”
She turned away.
“Don’t talk about it,” she said. “Sometime, when I’m not so busy, I’m goin’ up to the cemetery. That will be a bright, lively place compared to my sittin’ room just now. But I’ll get used to it, too. I’ve spent about half my life gettin’ used to things.”
That afternoon Esther had another new and overwhelming experience. She and her uncle went for a drive behind the span. Foster Townsend himself drove and his niece sat beside him upon the seat of the high wheeled dog-cart. The black horses stepped proudly, their curved necks glistening and the silver mounted harness a-jingle. People stopped to look at them as they passed, just as she, herself, had done so often. Then she had merely looked and envied—yes, and resented—the triumphal progress of this man, her father’s own brother, who had everything while she and her parents had had nothing. Now she was a part of that progress and, in spite of an occasional twinge of conscience, she found herself enjoying it. The reality of this marvelous change in her life was more and more forced upon her.
Now, as always, hats were lifted in acknowledgment of the royal presence, but now they were lifted to the princess as well as to the king. Proof of this was furnished by no less a personage than Captain Benjamin Snow, who hurried from his front gate and came out into the road. Townsend pulled the horses to a standstill and greeted the man whose influence in Harniss affairs was second only to his own.