"There! That will do," she said, leaning back in her chair, and laughing as she thought what her mother and Alice would say, if they knew what she had done. "But they needn't know it," she continued aloud, "until the money comes, and then they can't help themselves."
Then it occurred to her that if Dora herself were to send some message, the coming of the money might be surer; and calling her cousin into the room, she said:
"I am about writing to old Uncle Nat—have you any word or anything to send him?"
"Oh, yes," answered Dora. "Give him my love, and tell him how much I wish he would come home—and stay!" she added, leaving the room, and soon returning with a lock of soft brown hair, which she laid upon the table. "Give him that, and tell him it was mother's."
Had a serpent started suddenly into life before Eugenia, she could not have turned whiter than she did at the sight of that hair. It brought vividly to mind the shadowy twilight, the darkness in the corners, and the terror which came over her on that memorable night, when she had thought to steal Dora's treasure. Soon recovering her composure, however, she motioned her cousin from the room, and, resuming her pen, said to herself, "I shan't write all that nonsense about his coming home, for nobody wants him here; but the love and the hair may as well go."
Then, as she saw how much of the latter Dora had brought, she continued, "There's no need of sending all this. It would make beautiful hair ornaments, and I mean to keep a part of it; Dora won't care, of course, and I shall tell her."
Dividing off a portion of the hair for her own use, she laid it aside, and then in a postscript wrote, "Dora sends"—here she paused; and thinking that "Dora's love" would please the old man too much, and possibly give him too favorable an opinion of his niece, she crossed out the "sends," and wrote, "Dora wishes to be remembered to you, and sends for your acceptance a lock of her mother's hair."
Thus was the letter finished, and the next mail which left Dunwood bore it on its way to India, Eugenia little thinking how much it would influence her whole future life.
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