Vincent bent over and kissed her hand. Then he started towards the house. After half a dozen steps he halted suddenly and looked back, as though he would have spoken. His mother, however, had descended the terrace steps and was already bending over her flowers. So, after a little pause, he turned about again and continued thoughtfully upon his way.
CHAPTER II
Dr. Carroll's Idea
Deborah's bedroom was extremely small. It was merely one corner of the west wing, partitioned off from the spinning-room and the great hand-loom; and there was barely room in it for her bed, dressing-table, chest-of-drawers, washstand, and two chairs. Besides these necessities, there were two windows and a strip of carpet, to be regarded as luxuries. Deborah herself, however, curtained the bed and windows after her own fashion, in white India muslin, put a ruffled cover over the dressing-table, displayed what ornaments she possessed prettily about the room, and so regarded it with satisfaction ever after. Her two windows both looked out over the back of the plantation, the flower-garden being directly below, the woods to one side, the tobacco barns at a distance. The room underneath Deborah's, which occupied the whole of the west wing on the ground floor, had been given to Sir Charles; and in the passage that connected this with the main house were the stairs.
When Deborah woke from her dreamless sleep on the morning after the doctor's visit, the first active thought in her brain was of the dock sale for that day. It was rather later than her usual hour of waking, and she hurriedly began her toilet. Presently, however, as she was loosening her hair, her eyes fell upon the bottle of aconitum napellus which she had brought to her room after its preparation on the day before; and at sight of it her hands dropped to her sides, and she stood still for a moment in contemplation. Then a little shiver ran over her, and she performed something very like a shrug. "I don't like sick people," she muttered to herself, turning to sit down before her mirrored table.
If Deborah's words were quite honest, then certainly this morning she was looking forward to the dock sale with unusual pleasure. She had never before manifested any strong interest in these things. In fact, she had been known to say that they were tiresome. Men did not much frequent them; no young lady was allowed money to spend for herself; and the good housewives were always more interested in table-linens and utensils than ribbons or jewelry. Nevertheless, here, this morning, was Mistress Debby, plying her hair with more interest than she had had for it since the last assembly; and when it was all ringletted and quite smooth, she saw fit to use upon it a white ribbon that had never before been worn. Also, when Lucy cried at the door that she was to wear her blue lutestring petticoat and white muslin overdress, those garments lay ready upon a chair, though once or twice before, on like occasions, there had been some spirited conversation between Deborah and Madam Trevor before the young lady was willing to give up the perverse idea that her every-day holland was quite good enough for such an affair. When she was ready, and the lace mittens taken from their drawer, Deborah carefully placed her phial of distilled liquid in the neck of her dress, pushing it out of sight among the ruffles of her kerchief.
At nine o'clock the family coach, with four ladies inside it, left the house. Sir Charles, in scarlet and white, and Vincent, in bottle green, accompanied the vehicle on horseback. Vincent was reconciled to leaving his fields by the prospect of meeting some of the burgesses in the city and learning the details of yesterday's election of commissioners; while the lieutenant never needed strong urging to give a day to the mild amusements of the colonial town, with its coffee-house, its feeble imitators of English beauship, its jockey club, and what few pretty women were to be visited in the daytime. The clock on St. Anne's was booming the half-hour as the coach crossed the bridge over the inlet at the foot of Prince George Street; and here, in the last house of the town, a quaint wooden cottage in the midst of a well-shaded yard, dwelt Captain Croft of the Baltimore. At its gate Vincent, with a little nod to his mother, stopped.
"I've an errand here," he called to Fairfield. "Will be at Carroll's by twelve. Do you dine with us?"
The aide shook his head. "Thanks, no. I'll go to the coffee-house with Curtis and Belmont, if I do not dine at the Governor's. Are you coming to the assembly later?"
"Yes. Till this afternoon, then," and Vincent dismounted at the gate, while the coach, with its single cavalier, all unconscious of the significance of Vincent Trevor's errand, went on again. At the new Bladen Street Sir Charles turned off towards the Governor's "palace," while the vehicle kept on towards the water-side.