“Ah, you are at your old tricks of wheedling again,” replied her husband, all the while delighting in her caresses.
CHAPTER XIX
“We live in deeds, not years; in thoughts, not breaths; In feelings, not in figures on a dial.”
sang a poet, and so it was with Anne. Mortified pride and love of flattery were washed away in copious tears, and then the stings of remorseful conscience completed the good work. Her vanity crumbled into ashes, leaving only scars upon her heart, which was really pure and good at bottom.
At the end of that long week—made up as it seemed to Anne of hundreds of years—Mrs. Forrest came into the room, carefully shielding the lighted candle with her hand against the draft. Placing the candle upon the chest of drawers, she sat down beside the girl, huddled up in a chair with her face bowed upon her knees.
“I brought you away from your mother, Anne, and the responsibility of your welfare lies heavy upon my heart. Your conduct since coming here has grieved me sorely, but I still believe you are a good girl, and I hope this affair will be a lesson to you. If you live long enough, my child, you will learn that the love of a good man, no matter how humble his station, is of priceless value. It is no more to be compared to the idle words of a brainless fop than a diamond is to a bit of glass,” she continued, waxing eloquent as her emotions arose. “Come now, my child, is not your heart sore when you think of your mother?”
“Oh, more than I can tell you,” cried Anne, throwing herself on her knees and burying her face in her mistress’s lap. “Indeed I did not mean to do wrong, I was only thoughtless.”
“I believe you, Anne,” replied Mrs. Forrest, smoothing the girl’s disheveled curls, “and in the future I know you will be all that John Laydon could desire.”
“He will never forgive me, he is so proud,” sobbed Anne.