This was Hester’s letter, over which Magdalen pondered long, wondering if the old lady could have suspected her love for Roger, and how far she was right in thinking he missed her more than his money. Magdalen read that sentence many times, and her heart thrilled with delight at the thought of being missed by Roger; but from Hester’s suggestion that she should write him a friendly line, she turned resolutely away. The time was gone by when she could write to Roger without his having first written to her. After that interview in the library, when his kisses had burned into her heart, and his passionate words, “Magda, my darling,” had burned into her memory, she would be less than a woman to make the first advances. Concessions, if there were any, must come from him now. He knew how sorry she was about the will; he had exonerated her from all blame in that matter, and now, if he had any stronger feelings for her than that of a friend, he must make it manifest. This was Magdalen’s reasoning over the Roger portion of Hester’s letter, and then she thought of Frank, and felt a nervous dread lest he might follow her, though that seemed hardly possible, even if he knew where she was. Still he would undoubtedly write as soon as he could get her address from Roger, and she was not at all disappointed when, a week or two after the receipt of Hester’s letter, Mr. Grey brought her one from Belvidere, directed in Frank’s well known handwriting. After obtaining her address he had written at once, chiding her for having left so suddenly without a word for him, and begging of her to return, or at least allow him to come for her, and take her back to her rightful place at Millbank.
“I can’t imagine what freak of fortune led you to the Greys,” he wrote. “It is the last place where I could wish you to be. Not that I do not respect and esteem Miss Grey as the sweetest, loveliest of women, but I distrust both her father and her aunt. For some reason they have never seemed to like me, and may say things derogatory of me; but if they do, I trust it will make no difference with you, for remember you have known me all your lifetime.”
Magdalen wrote next day to Frank, who, as he read her letter, began for the first time to feel absolutely that she was lost to him forever. He was sure of that, and for a moment he wept like a child, thinking how gladly he would give up all his money if that would bring him Magdalen’s love. But it was not in his nature to be unhappy long, and he soon dried his eyes and consoled himself with a drive after his fast bays, and in the evening when his mother mentioned to him the names of two or three young ladies from New York who were coming to Millbank for the holidays, and asked if there was any one in particular whom he wished to invite, he mentioned Miss Burleigh, whom he had met in Springfield. And so Bell was invited, and hastened to reply that she should be delighted to come, but feared she could not, as “pa never liked to be separated from his family at that time, and sister Grace would be home from school, and could not, of course, be left behind.” She was so sorry, for she had heard such glowing accounts of Millbank, and its graceful mistress, that she ardently desired to see and know both, but as it was she must decline.
As might be supposed, the invitation to Miss Bell Burleigh was repeated, including this time the Judge and Grace, both of whom accepted, Grace for the entire holidays, and the Judge for a day or two, as he did not wish to crowd. And so Christmas bade fair to be kept at Millbank with more hilarity than ever it had been before. Every room was to be occupied, Bell and Grace Burleigh taking Magdalen’s, for which Frank ordered a new and expensive carpet and chamber set, just as he had ordered new furniture for many of the other rooms. He was living on a grand scale, and had his income been what his principal was he could scarcely have been more munificent or lavish of his money. He was at the head of every charitable object in Belvidere and Springfield, and gave so largely that his name was frequently in the papers which he sent to Magdalen, with his pencil mark about the flattering notices; and Magdalen smiled quietly as she read them and then showed them to Alice, who once laughingly remarked, “Suppose you refer him to Matthew vi. 2. It might be of some benefit to him.” And that was all the good Frank’s ostentatious charity did him in that direction.
Meantime the tide of life moved on, and Christmas came, and the invited guests arrived at Millbank, where there were such revellings and dissipations as the people of Belvidere had never seen, and where Bell Burleigh’s bold, black eyes flashed and sparkled and took in everything, and saw so many places where a change would be desirable should Millbank ever have another mistress than Mrs. Walter Scott.
Guy Seymour, too, had his holidays at Beechwood, which seemed a different place with his great, kind heart, his quick appreciation of another’s wants, his unfailing wit and humor, his merry whistle and exhilarating laugh, his good-natured teasing of Auntie Pen, and his entire devotion to Alice, who was rather reserved toward him, but who talked a great deal of him to Magdalen when they were alone, and cried when at last he went away.
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
THE MYSTERY AT BEECHWOOD.
A day or two after Guy’s return to New York there came to Beechwood a tall, muscular-looking woman, whom Alice called Mrs. Jenks, and for whom Magdalen could see no possible use. She did not consort with the family, nor with the servants, and Magdalen often met her in the upper hall, and saw her disappearing through the green baize door. It was about this time, too, that Mr. Grey left home for Cincinnati, and the household settled down into a state of quiet and loneliness, which, contrasting as it did with the merry holidays when Guy Seymour was there, seemed to both girls very hard to bear.
Alice was unusually restless, and when at last Guy wrote telling of a famous singer who had just appeared in New York, and asking them all to come down for a few days and hear for themselves, she caught eagerly at it, and overruling every objection, won her aunt’s consent to going. Magdalen was to accompany them, and she was anticipating the trip and what it might bring about, for Hester Floyd had written that Roger was in New York. But when the morning fixed upon for their journey came she was suffering with a prevailing influenza which made the trip impossible for her. She, however, insisted upon Alice’s going without her, and so for a few days she was left alone in the house so far as congenial companionship was concerned. Mrs. Jenks she never saw, though she knew she was there; for as she grew better and able to be about the parlors and library she heard the servants speak of the amount of wine she ordered with her dinner, while one of them added in a whisper, “Suppose she should get drunk and there should be a row, wouldn’t we be in a pretty mess. Nobody could control her.”