At last I said:
“You are troubled about Godfrey, Mrs. Schuyler,” and she replied:
“Yes,—no. I was not thinking of him, but of Gertie. Ettie, do you remember the people who lived in the cottage years ago, Mrs. Fordham and her daughter?”
“Yes,” I replied, “I remember them well. Why do you ask me that question?”
She was standing by the window now, gazing wistfully at the cottage and the smoke curling from the chimney.
“Did you like that girl? Heloise was her name,” she said, without answering my question.
“Yes,” I answered, “I was very fond of her, and thought her so beautiful, and I have often wondered where she was that she neither came back nor wrote, when she promised to do both.”
Crossing swiftly to my side and laying a hand on each of my shoulders she looked me steadily in the eye, and said:
“Ettie, is there anything in my face which reminds you of that girl?”
Then it came to me like a flash of lightning; all the perplexity and wonder I had at times experienced with regard to Mrs. Schuyler was made clear, and without stopping to think how it could be and thinking only that it was, I said: