Rosamond complied with each request, and then, never dreaming of the close examination to which her face was subjected, she began to speak of her beautiful home—describing it minutely, and dwelling somewhat at length upon the virtues of its owner.
"You like him very much," the lady said, nodding a little affirmative nod to her own question.
"Yes—very—very much," was Rosamond's answer; and the lady continued,
"And Mrs. Browning? Do you like her, too?"
"There is no Mrs. Browning," returned Rosamond, adding, quickly, as she saw in her auditor's face an expression she did not understand, "but it is perfectly proper I should live there, for Mrs. Peters, the housekeeper, has charge of me."
"Perhaps, then, he will marry you," and the jeweled hands worked nervously under the crimson shawl.
"Oh, no, he won't," said Rosamond, decidedly, "he's too old for me.
Why, his hair is turning gray!"
"That's nothing," answered the lady, a little sharply. "Everybody's hair turns early now-a-days. Sarah found three or four silver threads in mine, this morning. Miss Leyton, don't you love Mr. Browning?"
"Why, yes," Rosamond began, and the face upon the pillow assumed a dark and almost fiendish expression. "Why, yes, I love him as a brother, but nothing else. I respect him for his goodness, but it would be impossible to love him with a marrying love."
The fierce expression passed away, and Miss Porter was about to speak when Anna Lawrie sent for Rosamond, who excused herself and left the room, thinking that, after all, she should like her old enemy of Atwater Seminary very much.
Meantime "the enemy" had buried her face in her pillows, and clenching her blue veined fists, struck at the empty air, just as she would have struck at the owner of Riverside had he been standing there.