“’Tain’t no use, Mollie,” he would say. “You can’t make a whistle of a pig’s tail, and you can’t make a gentleman of me. My hard old hands have worked too long in stone and mortar to be cramped up in gloves or to handle them wide forks of yourn. I shall allus eat with my knife; it comes nateral-like and easy, and shall drink my tea in my sasser. But I like to see you go through with the jimcracks, and think you orter, if the colonel wants you to. You allus had the makin’ of a lady, even when your hands, where the diamonds is now, was cut and soiled with hard waxed ends, and nobody’ll think the wus of you, unless it’s some low-minded, jealous person who, when they see you in your best silk gownd may say how you was once poor as you could be, and closed nigger shoes for a livin’. That’s human nater, and don’t amount to nothin’. But, Mollie, though you can’t lift Peggy nor me, there’s your sister Margaret growin’ up as pretty and smart a gal as there is in Merrivale. You can give her a hist if you will, and mebby she’ll make as good a match as you. She’s the prettiest creetur I ever see.”

And in this John Ferguson was right, for Margaret was even more beautiful than her sister Mary. To the same dazzling purity of complexion, and large, lustrous blue eyes, she added a sweetness of expression and a softness of manner and speech unusual in one who had seen so little of the world. Mrs. Rossiter, who was allowed to do whatever she pleased, acted upon her father’s suggestion and had her sister often with her, and took her to Boston for a winter, and to Saratoga for a season, and it was in the Rossiter carriage that Frederick Hetherton first remarked the fresh, lovely young face which was to be his destiny. He might, and probably had, seen it before in church, or in the shop where he occasionally went for beer, but it had never struck him just as it did, when, framed in the pretty bonnet, with the blue ribbons vieing with the deeper, clearer blue of the large bright eyes which flashed a smile on him as he involuntarily lifted his hat.

Fred Hetherton was very fond of pretty faces, and it was whispered that he did not always follow them for good, and there were rumors afloat of large sums of money paid by his father for some of his love affairs, but, however that might be, his intentions were always strictly honorable with regard to Margaret Ferguson. At first his pride rebelled a little, for he was quite as proud as any of the Hethertons, and he shrank from Aunt Peggy more than Mr. Rossiter had done. But Margaret’s beauty overcame every scruple at last, and when his father, who had heard something of it in town, asked him if it were true that he was running after old Ferguson’s daughter, he answered boldly, “Yes, and I intend to make her my wife.”

A terrible scene ensued, and words were spoken which should never have passed between father and son, and the next day Fred Hetherton was missing from his home and Margaret Ferguson was missing from hers, and two days later Aunt Peggy went over to Hetherton Place and claimed relationship with its owner by virtue of a letter just received from her daughter who said she was married the previous day, and signed herself “Margaret Hetherton.” Then the father swore his biggest oaths, said his son was his no longer, that he was glad his wife had died before she knew of the disgrace, and ended by turning Peggy from his door and bidding her never dare claim acquaintance with him, much less relationship. What he wrote to his son in reply to a letter received from him announcing his marriage no one ever knew, but the result of it was that Frederick determined to go abroad at once, and wrote his father to that effect, adding that with the fortune left him by his mother he could live in luxury in Europe, and asked no odds of any one. This was true, and Mr. Hetherton had no redress, but walked the floors of his great lonely rooms foaming with rage and gnashing his teeth, while the Fergusons were crying over the letter sent to them by Margaret, who was then in New York, and who wrote of their intended departure for Europe.

She was very happy, she said, though she should like to come home for a few days and bid them good-by, but Frederick would not allow it. She would write them often, and never, never forget them. Then came a few lines written on shipboard, and a few more from Paris, telling of homesickness, of Frederick’s kindness, and the pearls and blue silk dress he had bought her. Then followed an interval of silence, and when Margaret wrote again a change seemed to have come over her, and her letters were stilted and constrained like those of a person writing under restraint, but showed signs of culture and improvement. She was still in Paris, and had masters in French and music and dancing, but of her husband she said very little, except that he was well, and once that he had gone to Switzerland with a party of French and English, leaving her alone with a waiting-maid whom she described as a paragon of goodness.

To this letter Mrs. Rossiter replied, asking her sister if she were really content and happy, but there came no response, and nothing more was heard from Margaret until she wrote of failing health and that she was going to Italy to see what a milder climate would do for her. Weeks and weeks went by, and then Mr. Hetherton himself wrote to Mr. Ferguson as follows:

“Geneva, Switzerland, May 15th, 18—.

“Mr. Ferguson.—Your daughter Margaret died suddenly of consumption in Rome, the 20th of last month, and was buried in the Protestant burying ground.

“Yours,

“F. Hetherton.”