“Yes,” he said, in answer to their inquiring looks, “we knew and loved each other years ago in Jefferson, where I first set up business. She was an orphan, and the sweetest creature I ever saw, but very much under the influence of an older sister—a proud, selfish, scheming, domineering woman. She, I have always thought it was, who came between my love and me. I meant to speak before I left, and tried to do so, but she contrived to foil every attempt. Then I wrote, and the answer was, I have little doubt, dictated or forged by her.”
“She rejected you?”
Mrs. Heywood’s tone was both inquiring and indignant.
“Yes, mother; but don’t condemn her unheard,” he said, with a smile of filial affection. “That in so doing she did not follow the dictates of her own heart I now know beyond a question.”
“I don’t want to be uncharitable, or to wound you, Rolfe,” returned his mother, flushing slightly, “but that any woman should reject the man she loves and marry another seems to me both weak and wicked.”
“Wait, my dear, till you have heard her story,” said the old gentleman. “We don’t know how she may have been deceived and betrayed.”
A few days later Rolfe came to his mother with an explanation which even in her eyes exculpated Ethel.
“Ah, well, poor thing! she’s had a hard time of it,” said the old lady, wiping away a tear. “And I hope, Rolfe, if she falls into your hands you’ll try to make it up to her.”
“I shall indeed,” he said, with a peculiar and very happy smile. “Come, mother, come to her room with me. The minister is there, my father and Ada too, and Ethel and I are now to be made one for life.”
“Rolfe!” she cried in astonishment.