“I wonder what makes that woman act so? The first time I ever saw her she stared at me as if she would eat me up; and just now there was positively something frightful in her eyes as they looked up at me; I do not believe I like her.”
Just here Margery appeared, apologizing for her mother, who, she said was wholly overcome with all Queenie’s kindness to them.
“Yes, I know. I do it for you,” Queenie said, a little petulantly, for she did not care at all if Margery knew of her aversion to her mother.
It was time now for her to go if she would see her cousins, and promising Margery to look in upon her in the morning and bring her a pile of dresses which needed repairing, she entered her carriage, and was driven to the Knoll, where the family were just sitting down to supper.
Taking a seat with them, Queenie talked and laughed, and sparkled, and shone, until the room seemed full of her, and the bewildered major could have sworn there were twenty pairs of eyes flashing upon him instead of one, while Ethel and Grace held their breath and watched her as the expression of her bright face changed with every new gesture of her hands and turn of her head.
“She is so bright and beautiful, and different from anything we ever saw,” they thought, while Mrs. Rossiter, though no less fascinated than her daughters, was conscious of a feeling of disappointment because she could discover no resemblance to her sister in her sister’s child. She was unmistakably a Hetherton, though with another look in her dark face and wonderful eyes which puzzled Mrs. Rossiter as she sat watching her with constantly increasing interest, and listening to her gay bad-Phil and the major, the latter of whom seemed half afraid of her, and was evidently ill at ease when her eyes lighted upon him.
Supper being over Reinette arose to go, saying to her aunt and cousins:
“I shall expect you to dine with me to-morrow at six o’clock. It is to be a family party, but Major Rossiter is included in the invitation. I am going now to ask grandma and Aunt Lydia. Will you go with me, Phil?”
They found Grandma Ferguson weeding her flower borders in front of her house, with her cap and collar off, and her spotted calico dress open at the throat.
“It is too hot to be harnessed up with fixin’s,” she said, and when Reinette, who did not like the looks of her neck, suggested that a collar or ruffle did not greatly add to one’s discomfort in warm weather and gave a finish to one’s dress, she replied: “Law, child, it don’t matter an atom what I wear. Everybody knows Peggy Ferguson.” Reinette gave a little deprecating shrug and then delivered her invitation, which was accepted at once, grandma saying, “She could come early so as to have a good visit before dinner, though she presumed Mary and the gals wouldn’t be there till the last minit.”