“Poor soul! You have acted—I won’t say how; it is not for me to preach. I will telegraph to Miss Griselda and then go with you to find Rupert Lovel and his boy.”
[CHAPTER XXVII.—TWO MOTHERS.]
“Here is a letter for you, ma’am.”
Nancy was standing by her mistress, who, in a traveling cloak and bonnet, had just come home.
“For me, Nancy?” said the lady of the forest in a tired voice. “Who can want to write to me? And yet, and yet—give it to me, Nancy.”
“It has the London postmark, ma’am. Dear heart, how your hands do shake!”
“It is evening, Nancy, and to-morrow will be the 5th of May. Can you wonder that my hands shake? Only one brief summer’s night, and my day of bliss arrives!”
“Read your letter, ma’am; here it is.”
Mrs. Lovel received the envelope with its many postmarks, for it had traveled about and performed quite a little pilgrimage since it left Avonsyde some days ago. Something in the handwriting caused her to change color; not that it was in the ordinary sense familiar, but in a very extraordinary manner it was known and sacred.
“The ladies of Avonsyde have been true to the letter of their promise!” she exclaimed. “This, Nancy,” opening her letter and glancing hastily through it, “is the invitation I was promised six years ago for Rachel’s thirteenth birthday. It has been sent to the old, old address. The ladies have not forgotten; they have kept to the letter of their engagement. Nancy dear, let me weep. Nancy, to-morrow I can make my own terms. Oh, I could cry just because of the lifting of the pain!”