It was a chilly afternoon in October, and Amber made herself as charming as possible, putting on her handsomest carriage gown and a stylish new hat just received from New York, hoping to impress Mrs. Grant with her beauty and grandeur.
She left the carriage at the gate and walked through the grounds, now glowing in autumnal splendor, up to the splendid old ruin with the ivy draping its battlemented towers, hoping she might perchance meet Cecil loitering about.
But Cecil was nowhere to be seen, and when she lifted the rusty knocker at the hall-door, the old black servant who took her card looked at her as angrily as if she had been the old judge himself.
“I donno as missis is to home or not—leastwise she’s berry po’ly,” she said, drawing herself up in grim majesty, for Judge Camden’s evil deed was known in the kitchen as well as in the parlor, and deeply resented.
“Wha’ fer she come pokin’ aroun’ here arter her old grandad done act so shameful? S’pose he done sent her to see how po’ ole miss takes it to be turn outer house an’ home like dis?” thought Aunt Dinah, angrily, and Amber read her thought.
“Oh, Aunt Dinah, please don’t be angry with me for my grandfather’s doings! I am so sorry he has foreclosed the mortgage, and I came to tell dear Mrs. Grant that I am ashamed of it all,” cried the beauty, so sweetly that the old woman’s anger was at once disarmed, and with returning smiles, she ushered the visitor into the large, shabby parlor, with its faded carpet and curtains, and took the card to her mistress.
Mrs. Grant was in her own cozy little sitting-room, lying dejectedly upon a sofa drawn near the glowing wood-fire in the grate, and she looked with a weary frown at the bit of pasteboard, exclaiming:
“Amber Laurens! Why, what does the girl want with me? I should think she would have better taste than to come to Bonnycastle now.”
“Oh, missis, she tole me dat she am real sorry her grandad act so ugly by you, and she come to tell you so. An’, missis, she am got on de beautifulest gown I ebber seen, all black and yaller silk, and de fines’ hat, black velvit wid yaller canary birds onto it, as nateral as life! I sholy did like dem fine clothes!” admitted Aunt Dinah.
“But, Dinah, I do not feel well enough to see callers to-day. You must tell Miss Laurens to excuse me,” murmured the lady, shrinking from a meeting with any of the household from Golden Willows.