“Not a great deal,” answered her daughter. “I got tired of Clayton.”
“But not of Col. Coutell?” asked Mrs. Gwinn, eagerly.
“Yes, rather. Don’t you think he is a little old, and far too stately in his ways?” and the girl looked in a careless, listless manner across the room.
“Gwendoline!” exclaimed her mother, sharply. “This is folly! You know that Col. Coutell is deeply in love with you and has spoken to me of his desire to make you his wife. He is one of the wealthiest of men, and you are aware that your father left us but a bare competency. Can you, for a moment, dream of the luxury of a love match—you, with your idle society ways—you, who loll away the early morn and play with the midnight hours? Oh! no, my daughter; you must marry for a bed of roses, with a gilded canopy!” and the handsome woman, who herself had enjoyed all this, rose and crossed the room to where her daughter sat, placing her white hand on the girl’s shoulder, with a sarcastic laugh.
Gwendoline sprang to her feet, tossing her tawny mane, as she shook off her mother’s hand.
“Mamma!” she exclaimed, “this is too much! I will not be bartered for like a Virginia slave! I am weary, weary of it all, and I can stand it no longer! Why should I marry at all?”
“Why?” said her mother, waving her white hand slowly back and forth. “Why, Gwendoline, for a very simple reason—you cannot help it! My dear, you are hardly the woman to fill the role of an old maid. No, no, there is too much fire there!” Then, as she walked slowly to the end of the room, she murmured below her breath, “Latent heat!”
The girl had thrown herself into a chair beside the window. Just then a servant entered with a note for Mrs. Gwinn, who, having read it, passed it to her daughter.
“Well, will you accept?”
It seemed a long while, but at last an answer came.