“She was a wild, rattle-brained creature, I was sure, but her flow of spirits suited my mood, and for the sole purpose of seeing her I called to Bell, who, the next moment, was asking anxiously what I wanted.
“‘I am better,’ I said. ‘Am well; and I want you to open the blinds so I can see; then all come in where I can hear you talk. Who is that with the cheery whistle?’
“‘Eureka! she thinks my whistle beautiful!’ I heard from the next room, while Bell replied:
“‘It’s sister Jessie. She came last night, and has nearly driven us wild already with her fun and spirits. She stopped for a few days at Saratoga, and saw your sister. Shall I call her?’
“‘Yes,’ I said; and Jessie came at once,—a little fairy, hoydenish creature, with the sauciest, merriest face, the roundest black eyes, and a head covered with short, black curls, which shook as she talked, and kept time with the twinkle of her eyes.
“She kissed me heartily, and then, perching herself upon the foot of the bed, told me about Saratoga,—what a little paradise it was at the Clarendon,—so clean and nice; what a splendid man the proprietor was, treating his boarders as if they were invited guests; humoring everybody’s whim, even to muzzling the poor dog who barked at night, thereby disturbing some nervous invalid,—told me too what a love of a man she thought Squire Russell.
“‘Mrs. Russell is your sister,’ she went on, ‘and so I say nothing of her, pro nor con, except that it must be good pious work to live with her,’ and the curls and the eyes danced together.
“I could not be angry, and the gypsy rattled on:
“‘But that Mr. Russell is my beau ideal of husbands. I made him promise if he ever was a widower, he’d take me for his second wife. There’s nothing I’d like better, I told him, than to mother his six children. You ought to have seen my lady then!’ and the queer, little face put on a look so like Margaret’s that I could not forebear laughing, knowing, as I did, how shocked my sister must have been.
“‘“Husband,” she said, “I think it’s wrong to trifle with matters so sacred!” Whereupon the husband meekly subsided, and fanned her connubially with the Saratoga paper. Oh, he’s a splendid fellow, but I used to pity him evenings when I saw him standing over his wife’s chair, looking so wistfully at the dancers. She wouldn’t let him waltz,—thought it was very improper, and I was told made several remarks not very complimentary to my style of tripping the light fantastic toe. She is rather pretty, and one night when she wore a pale blue silk, with all her diamonds and point-lace, she was the finest-looking woman in the room.’