She could have cried with disappointment and mortification, and crying was not at all in Mollie's line. Never until now had she given up the hope that he still loved her.
"It serves me right, I dare say," she thought, bitterly. "I have been a flirt and a triller, and I refused him cruelly, heartlessly, for that old man. Oh! if the past could be but undone, what a happy, happy creature I should be!"
The oppressive silence lasted until Mrs. Sharpe re-entered with some needle-work. Then Mr. Ingelow rose and looked at his watch.
"I believe I'll take a stroll down Broadway," he said, a little coldly. "Your friend Miriam will probably be here before I return. If not, there are books yonder with which to beguile the time."
Mollie bowed, proudly silent, and Mr. Ingelow left the room for his morning constitutional. Miss Dane walked over, took a book, opened it, and held it before her face a full hour without turning a leaf. The face it screened looked darkly bitter and overcast. She was free from prison, only to find herself in a worse captivity—fettered by a love that could meet with no return.
The bright morning wore on; noon came. Two o'clock brought dinner and Mr. Ingelow, breezy from his walk.
"What!" he exclaimed, looking round, "no Miriam?"
"No Miriam," said Mollie, laying down her book. "Mrs. Sharpe and I have been quite alone—she sewing, I reading."
Mrs. Sharpe smiled to herself. She had been watching the young lady, and surmised how much she had read.
"Why, that's odd, too," Mr. Ingelow said. "She promised to be here this morning, and Miriam keeps her promises, I think. However, the afternoon may bring her. And now for dinner, mesdames."