Looking upon Godfrey as her own especial property, Alice felt that whatever affected the Schuylers affected her, and she was sorry accordingly for this thing about to happen, but it did not hurt her as it did Julia and Emma, who must call the strange woman mother, and who wept on until Miss Rossiter sent for them to come to her room together with Miss Creighton. She had taken some brandy, and felt better, though her heart was aching still with a dreary sense of loss, and disappointment, and disgrace, if half Godfrey had written was true, and half was all that any stretch of her imagination would allow her to believe, and when the young girls entered the room she said to them:
“I have sent for you to talk over this dreadful thing, and to say that I do not credit all Godfrey’s story. He is a sad boy to exaggerate, you know. Still, let the woman be what she may, we do not want her here where we have been so happy.”
Miss Rossiter’s voice faltered a little, but soon recovering herself, she continued:
“No, we do not want her here; and I for one declare war,—war to the knife!”
She spoke bitterly now, and her black eyes flashed with contemptuous scorn.
“But Aunt Christine,” Emma said, “it is father’s house, and he will not let you treat her badly.”
“Nor shall I,” Miss Rossiter said, loftily; “I shall let her alone severely, and leave as soon as possible after her arrival. Nor shall I leave my sister’s daughters with the adventuress. I’ve been thinking it over, and have concluded to rent or buy a place in New York, and set up housekeeping for myself, in which case you will go with me, and leave your father to enjoy life with his low-born bride.”
“Father wrote she was a lady, and Godfrey says we shall like her,” Emma quickly interposed, feeling that for herself she preferred staying with the “adventuress” to living with Aunt Christine.
Julia, on the contrary, was caught with the house in New York. The city was far more to her taste than the dull country, and, with a withering glance at her sister, she said:
“I’m ashamed of you, Em, that you cannot appreciate auntie’s offer, but speak, instead, for that woman. I, for one, am greatly obliged to auntie, and shall go with her to New York?”