"N-o."
"It is not lacking in intelligence or character?"
"Not so far as I am able to judge from a simple picture", the woman confessed, rather reluctantly.
"And yet it does not flatter her; you do not often see a face like that even among the noble families of England, and she is as lovely in mind as in person," said Sir William, fondly, as he took up one of the photographs and gazed upon it with his heart in his eyes.
"Humph! if you are so proud of your American bride, why did you not bring her home with you?" Lady Linton inquired, in a mocking tone, and then could have bitten her tongue through for having allowed herself to betray her curiosity so far.
Sir William flushed hotly. It was evident that his sister was no more reconciled since seeing Virgie's pictures than before. Her pride of birth had received a shock which she could neither overlook nor forgive.
"Lady Heath was not able to travel. Her physician told me that if she crossed the ocean it would be at the risk of her life. Miriam, Virgie will soon become a mother, God willing."
Lady Linton started and shot a swift look of astonishment at her brother upon this unexpected announcement.
This information was disagreeable in the extreme, for it made certain plans, which her fertile brain had begun to weave as soon as she had learned that her brother had returned without his wife, all the more complicated, if not well-nigh impossible.
"It was a great trial for me to return without her," Sir William went on, with a regretful sigh, "but your summons was so very imperative that I felt obliged to do so. My darling bore it very bravely, however; she regarded it as my duty to hasten to my mother, even though she would be left alone, a stranger in a great city, and at such a critical time."