Katy did not cry, nor utter a word of remonstrance; she was fast learning that quiet submission was better than useless opposition, and so Silverton was again given up. But there was one consolation. Seeing Marian Hazelton would be almost as good as going home, for had she not recently come from that neighborhood, bringing with her the odor from the hills and freshness from the woods. Perhaps, too, she had lately seen Helen or Morris at church, and had heard the music of the organ which Helen played, and the singing of the children just as it sometimes came to Katy in her dreams, making her start in her sleep and murmur snatches of the sacred songs which Dr. Morris taught. Yes, Marian could tell her of all this, and very impatiently Katy waited for the morning when she would drive around to Fourth Street with the piles of sewing she was going to take to Marian.
"Dear Marian, I wonder is she very poor?" Katy thought, as she next day made her preparations for the call, and had Wilford been parsimoniously inclined, he might have winced could he have seen the numerous stores gathered up for Marian and packed away in the carriage with the bundle of cambric and linen and lace, all destined for that fourth-story chamber where Marian Hazelton sat that summer morning, looking drearily out upon the dingy court and contrasting its sickly patch of grass, embellished with rain water barrels, coal hods and ash pails, with the country she had so lately left, the wooded hills and blooming gardens of Silverton, which had been her home for nearly two years.
It was a fault of Marian's not to remain long contented in any place, and so tiring of the country she had returned to the great city, urged on by a strange desire it may be to see Mrs. Wilford Cameron, to know just how she lived, to judge if she were happy, and perhaps—some time see Wilford Cameron, herself unknown, for not for the world would she have met face to face the man who had so often stood by Genevra Lambert's grave in the churchyard beyond the sea. Thinking she might succeed better alone, she had hired a room far up the narrow stairway of a high, somber-looking building, and then from her old acquaintances, of whom she had several in the city, she had solicited work. More than once she had passed the handsome house on Madison Square where Katy lived, walking slowly and gazing with dim eyes which could not weep at Wilford Cameron's luxurious home, and contrasting it with hers, that one room, which yet was not wholly uninviting, for where Marian went there was always an air of humble comfort; and Katy, as she crossed the threshold, uttered an exclamation of delight at the cheerful, airy aspect of the apartment, with its bright ingrain carpet, its simple shades of white, its chintz-covered lounge, its one rocking-chair, its small parlor stove, and its pots of flowers upon the broad window sill.
"Oh, Marian," she exclaimed, tripping across the floor, and impulsively throwing her arms around Miss Hazelton's neck, "I am so glad to meet some one from home. It seems almost like Helen I am kissing," and her lips again met those of Marian Hazelton, who amid her own joy at finding Katy unchanged, wondered what the Camerons would say to see their Mrs. Wilford kissing a poor seamstress whom they would have spurned.
But Katy did not care for Camerons then, or even think of them, as in her rich basquine and pretty hat, with emeralds and diamonds sparkling on her fingers, she sat down by Marian, whose hands, though delicate and small, showed marks of labor such as Katy had never known.
"You must forgive me for going over your house," Marian said, after they had talked together a moment, and Katy had told how sorry she was to miss the call. "I could not resist the temptation, and it did me so much good, although I must confess to a good cry when I came back and thought of the difference between us."
There was a quiver of her lip and a tone in her voice which touched Katy's heart, and she tried to comfort her, forgetting entirely whether what she said was proper or not, and impetuously letting out that even in houses like hers there was trouble. Not that she was unhappy in the least, for she was not; but, oh! the fuss it was to be fashionable and keep from doing anything to shock his folks, who were so particular about every little thing, even to the way she tied her bonnet and sat in a chair.
This was what Katy said, and Marian, looking straight into Katy's face, felt that she would not exchange places with the young girl-wife whom so many envied.
"Tell me of Silverton," was Katy's next remark. "You don't know how I want to go there; but Wilford does not think it best—that is, at present. Next fall I am surely going. I picture to myself just how it will look; Morris' garden, full of the autumnal flowers—the ripe peaches in our orchard, the grapes ripening on the wall, and the long shadows on the grass, just as I used to watch them, wondering what made them move so fast, and where they could be going. Will it be unchanged, Marian? Do places seem the same when once we have left them?" and Katy's eager eyes looked wistfully at Marian, who replied: "Not always—not often, in fact; but in your case they may. You have not been long away."
"Only a year," Katy said. "I was as long as that in Canandaigua; but this past year is different. I have seen so much, and lived so much, that I feel ten years older than I did last spring, when you and Helen made my wedding dress. Darling Helen! When did you see her last?"