“And devoted to you,” went on Heather.
“I wish I were more worthy his devotion,” answered Bessie.
“I wish I could understand you,” was Mrs. Dudley’s answer, after a pause.
“I do not think there is much to understand,” said Bessie; but her heart gave a great leap as she spoke, for she knew she was telling a truthful woman a falsehood.
“I only meant that you strike me as being a little odd at times,” remarked Heather, gently.
“Not more odd than you strike me as being,” was the reply. Then, noticing that her companion seemed surprised, she went on, “Cannot you comprehend? won’t you comprehend that to a girl brought up as I have been, a woman such as you are is an enigma, a wonder, a never-ending, always beginning puzzle?”
“What do you mean?” Heather paused in their walk back towards the house as she asked this question; and I should like you to take your first look at her as she stands thus intent and unconscious.
Hair of the mellowest, darkest auburn, out of which the original red still gleamed in the sunlight; eyes brown, and deep and tender; the fairest, softest, womanliest complexion; teeth white and regular; a full and somewhat large mouth, parted as she waited for Bessie’s reply.
Altogether a firm face, and yet gentle—the face of a woman who had not known much sorrow, and yet whom you instinctively felt could endure patiently almost any amount of trouble which she might be called upon to bear; the face of a woman who had from her earliest years thought of others first, of herself last; the face of a woman whom, once married, a man would know it was hopeless for him to love with a sinful passion, but who would be a man’s good friend, his very right hand, in time of need; a face in which there was “help;” a face, which no person who had once seen it ever quite forgot, which you could not fancy changing and altering like the countenances of much more beautiful women.
It was the inner loveliness of her nature, its purity, its steadfastness, its pitiful tenderness which made her seem so exceeding fair. It was the gentleness and the charity, the patience and the unselfishness abiding in her, which shone in her eyes and drew people towards her.