As she grew older this equanimity increased. She laughed and jested with those about her when they were in pleasant moods; when the reverse was the case, when her aunt Celia took her grand-niece to task for the general sins of the human race, Dolly either left the house as soon as she decently could, or if that were impossible, busied herself about domestic matters or worked with rare industry at whatever article of apparel she was making, till the storm blew over, and the domestic atmosphere was clear once more.
There were those who, knowing Miss Celia's temper, wondered Dolly could live with it and its owner; but if people do not object to rain, bad weather cannot seriously affect their spirits, and accordingly, in spite of the usual inclemency of the climate at Eglantine Cottage, Dolly spent some not unhappy years under its roof.
All the great, passionate, unruly love her untrained nature had yet given to any one, she had laid, the first year she was in her teens, in her father's grave.
The world,—her poor little narrow world, did what it could for the orphan, but, as was natural, failed to sympathize fully in her grief.
That was enough for Dolly. She did not trouble the world with much outward evidence of sorrow after that. The wound closed externally, bled internally. Her bed-room in the roof of Eglantine Cottage, selected by herself because there she was out of the way, the lonely woods around Dassell Court, the alder-trees growing by the trout streams, quiet lanes bordered by wild roses, holly and blackberries, and even quieter fields where the half-horned cattle browsed peacefully,—could have told tales of long weary fits of crying, of broken-hearted inquiries as to why such things should be, of an insensate struggle against the inevitable,—of very, very bad half-hours indeed when Dolly wished she was lying beside her father in Dassell's quiet church-yard.
Time went by; and if the wound was not healed it ceased to bleed at any rate. Life had to be gone through, and Dolly was not one to lengthen the distance between the miles with useless repinings. Though she probably had never read "A Winter's Tale" with sufficient attention to know that
"A merry heart goes all the day,
Your sad tires in a mile-a!"
she seemed to have adopted that couplet for her ensampler.
She might, as Miss Trebasson suspected, have no soul, but she was possessed of a wonderful temper—of a marvellous elasticity.
She took life after the fashion of an amiable cat or dog. If people stroked and patted her, she purred and gambolled for joy; if they were out of sorts she crept away from sight till that mood was past.