He was very white, and there was a strange look in his eyes, but his voice was perfectly natural as he spoke, and one who knew nothing of his former relations to Miss McDonald would never have suspected how his whole soul was moved by this gift to his little daughter.
"You must write and thank her," he said to Julia, who, knowing that this was proper, assented without a word, and when on the morning after Christmas Miss McDonald opened with trembling hands the envelope bearing the Cuylerville post-mark, she felt a keen pang of disappointment in finding only a few lines from Julia, who expressed her own and little Daisy's thanks for the beautiful Christmas box, and signed herself:
"Truly, Mrs. Guy Thornton."
Not Julia, but Mrs. Guy, and that hurt Daisy more than anything else.
"Mrs. Guy Thornton! Why need she thrust upon me the name I used to bear?" she whispered, and her lip quivered a little, and the tears sprang to her eyes as she remembered all that lay between the present and the time when she had been Mrs. Guy Thornton.
She was Miss McDonald now, and Guy was another woman's husband, and with a bitter pain in her heart, she put away Julia's letter, saying, as she did so, "And that's the end of that."
The box business had not resulted just as she hoped it would. She had thought Guy would write himself, and by some word or allusion assure her of his remembrance, but instead, there had come to her a few perfectly polite and well-expressed lines from Julia, who had the impertinence to sign herself Mrs. Guy Thornton! It was rather hard and sorely disappointing, and for many days Miss McDonald's face was very white and sad, and both the old and young whom she visited as usual wondered what had come over the beautiful lady, to make her "so pale and sorry."
[CHAPTER XI.—AT SARATOGA.]
There were no more letters from Mrs. Guy Thornton until the next Christmas, when another box went to little Daisy, and was acknowledged as before. Then another year glided and a third box went to Daisy, and then one summer afternoon in the August following, there came to Saratoga a gay party from New York, and among other names registered at one of the large hotels was that of Miss McDonald. It seemed to be her party, or at least she was its center, and the one to whom the others deferred as to their head. Daisy was in perfect health that summer, and in unusually good spirits; and when in the evening, yielding to the entreaties of her friends, she entered the ball-room, clad in flowing robes of blue and white, with costly jewels on her neck and arms, she was acknowledged at once as the star and belle of the evening. She did not dance,—she rarely did that now, but after a short promenade through the room she took a seat near the door, and was watching the gay dancers, when she felt her arm softly touched, and turning saw her maid standing by her, with an anxious, frightened look upon her face.
"Come, please, come quick," she said, in a whisper; and following her out, Miss McDonald asked what was the matter.