“I hope to hear just such good news some time of George Merrington and the others. Perhaps even Philip Desha may find consolation.”
She and Mother Maxwell exchanged congratulations, for Mae had written her aunt by the same post, telling of her happiness.
“Florian is a splendid match for sweet Mae—young, rich, talented, and good. She will be very happy, I am sure,” cried Viola; adding: “He says he wants to be married in May, so I think, mother dear, that I shall slip over to Paris, select a handsome trousseau as my wedding-gift to our dear girl, and then we will turn our faces homeward, so as to assist at the wedding.”
So, when the snow-drops and crocus began to star the greensward in early March, Viola came home again to her father and aunt, who had fretted sorely over her absence, though they had not complained, because, as Aunt Edwina naively said, they hoped she was “getting over things.”
Whether she had “got over things” or not, Viola did not say. She was even more beautiful, if that were possible, than before she went abroad; but it was not the arch beauty of the girl Viola, but the chastened loveliness of the woman who has suffered, and gained depth of feeling and nobility by her experience. In her great, luminous gray eyes lurked a haunting sadness, and her smile had a pensive expression unknown to it before.
“Since I met thee last,
O’er thy brow a change hath passed;
In the softness of thine eyes,
Deep and still a shadow lies;
From thy voice there thrills a tone