Phil was very tired, for he had been busy since the arrival of Reinette’s telegram at his grandmother’s, his Aunt Lydia’s, his own home, and at Hetherton Place, where he filled the rooms with flowers brought from the Knoll gardens and conservatory and with the beautiful pond lilies which he went himself upon the river to procure. The most of these he arranged in Reinette’s chamber, for there was a great pity in Phil’s heart for the young girl whose home-coming would be so sad. Of himself, or how he would impress Reinette, he never but once thought, and that when, chancing to pass the mirror, he caught sight of his hat, which was rather the worse for wear.
“I certainly must honor my cousin with a new hat, for this is unpardonably shabby,” he thought, and remembering his bet with Arthur Beresford, and how sure he was to win, he went into a hatter’s on his return to town, and selecting a soft felt, which was very becoming, and added to his jaunty appearance, he had it charged to his friend, and then went in quest of some laborer to take with him to the grave-yard.
But there was none to be found, and so he set off alone with hoe and rake, and sickle, and waged so vigorous a warfare upon the weeds, and grass, and briers, that the lot, though far from being presentable, was soon greatly changed in its appearance. But Phil had miscalculated the time, and while pruning the willows which drooped over Mrs. Hetherton’s grave, he suddenly heard in the distance the whistle of the train not over a mile away.
To drop his knife, don his coat, and wipe the blood from a bramble scratch on his hand, was the work of an instant, and then Phil went flying across the fields the shortest way to the station, racing with the locomotive speeding so swiftly across the meadows by the river-side until it reached the station, where a crowd of people was collected, and where grandma and Mrs. Lydia waited in their black, and Anna in her white, while Mr. Beresford, who had come up in his own carriage, stood apart from them, nervous and expectant, and wondering where Phil could be—poor Phil! tumbling over stone walls, bounding over fences, and leaping over bogs in his great haste to be there, and only stopping to breathe when he rolled suddenly down a bank and was obliged to pick himself and his hat up, and wipe the dirt from his pants and rub his grazed ankle. Then he went on, but the train had deposited its freight, living and dead, and shot away under the bridge, leaving upon the platform a young girl with a white, scared face, and great bright black eyes, which flashed upon the staring crowd glances of wonder and inquiry.
It was an exquisite little figure, with grace in every movement; but the crape which Grandma Ferguson had expected to see upon it was not there. Indeed, it had never occurred to Reinette that mourning was needed to tell of the bitter pain at her heart; and she wore the same gray camel’s hair which had done duty on shipboard, and which, though very plain, fitted her so admirably, and was so unmistakably stylish and Parisian, that Anna began at once to think how she would copy it. Reinette’s sailor hat was the color of her dress, and twisted around it and then tied under her chin was a long blue veil, while her gloves were of embroidered Lisle thread, and came far up under the deep white cuff, which was worn outside her closely fitting sleeve.
All this Anna noted at a single glance, as she did the dainty little boot, which the short dress made so visible.
“She isn’t in black; you might have saved yourself all that bother,” Anna said, under her breath, while her grandmother was thinking the same thing and sighing regretfully for the cool muslin lying at home, while she was sweating at every pore in her heavy bombazine.
But she meant well, and secure in this consciousness, she pressed forward to welcome and embrace her grandchild, just as Mr. Beresford stepped up to the young lady.
The crowd of people had confused and bewildered Reinette, and, for an instant she had thought of nothing but the box which was being lifted from the car, and which Pierre, half crazed himself, was superintending, while he jabbered first his unintelligible French, and then his scarcely more intelligible English. But when the box was carefully put down and the train had started, she threw rapid glances around her in quest of the only one on whom she felt she had any claim, Mr. Beresford, her father’s friend and agent who was looking at her, curiously, and thinking at first that though very stylish she certainly was not handsome. But when, in their rapid sweep, the dark eyes fell upon him and seemed to rest there inquiringly he began to change his mind; and as the Ferguson party were evidently waiting for him to make the first advance, and Phil was not there, he walked up to her, and offering her his hand, said, in his well-bred, gentlemanly way.
“Miss Hetherton, I believe?”