“By the way, Howard, would you mind driving round by the cottage on your way home and bringing Gertie with you? The snow is so deep and the walking so bad.”
“I shall not have time,” he answered, a little stiffly, as he buttoned his overcoat, “and then, you forget that such people do not mind mud and snow. They are used to it.”
He was gone before Edith could utter a word, and with a swelling heart she watched him driving down the avenue, and then bending over the cradle of her boy, she shed the first really bitter tears she had known since coming to Schuyler Hill. It is true she had received insolence from Miss Rossiter,, coldness from Julia, and indifference from Alice; but these had weighed little when her husband’s uniform kindness and consideration were in the opposite scale, and now it seemed as if he, too, were against her, and for a time she cried silently, wondering if she had done wrong to befriend the orphan girl, and if her coming there would be the beginning of discord between herself and husband.
“Mrs. Schuyler, please, may I come in? It’s I,—Gertie,” a soft voice said at the door; and starting up Edith went to meet the young girl, and winding her arms around her, kissed her lovingly, while all doubts of right and wrong were swept away with her first glance into the bright, innocent face, and the soft blue eyes looking at her so wonderingly.
Gertie had never expected the carriage to come for her. As the colonel said, she was accustomed to mud and snow, and had walked to the Hill and entered at the side door with Norah, who, knowing the position she was to occupy in the house, took her up stairs at once, and, pointing out her room, left her, while she went to change her wet shoes and stockings. But Gertie could not believe this pretty room was intended for her. There must be some mistake, she thought; and, seeing the door opposite slightly ajar, and knowing it led into the nursery, and that Mrs. Schuyler was probably there, she ventured to knock and ask if she might enter. There was something peculiarly restful about Gertie,—something mesmeric in her presence, which everybody felt for good, and which affected Edith at once, making her forget for a moment her husband’s words and manner.
“I am so glad to have you here, and this is your room,” she said, as she led her into her pleasant chamber. “I wanted you near me and baby, he is so fond of you.”
She removed Gertie’s hood and cloak, and smoothed her rippling hair, and thought how pretty she was in black, and wondered where she had seen an expression like that which flashed into the blue eyes and spread over the bright face at her caresses.
It was an hour before dinner, and Gertie spent the time with Edith and in playing with little Jamie, who, at sight of her, gave a coo of delight, and nearly jumped into her arms. He was an active, playful child, and Gertie was sorry when the nurse came to take him, telling Mrs. Schuyler dinner was ready. This was an ordeal Gertie dreaded, and in a kind of nervous terror she cried, “Oh, Mrs. Schuyler, I wish I did not have to go down. Can’t I stay here and eat by myself?”
“Certainly not,” Edith replied, knowing the while that such a thing would be highly satisfactory to one of the young ladies, at least, and possibly to her husband, but, nevertheless, being fully resolved that every privilege of the house, whether great or small, should be awarded to her protégée. “Certainly not, you are one of us now. You are my little girl;” and she passed her arm caressingly around the child. “Watch me, if you like, and do what you see me do.”
Thus reassured, Gertie entered the long dining-room with as much self-possession as if she had done the same thing every day of her life.