“My dear,” he said, taking the little hand, “I have always wanted to know you; Elizabeth will tell you that. I lost my heart to your sisters the first day I saw them. I am sure we shall be good friends in time, if you will forgive an old man’s pride.” And then he patted her hand as though she had been an infant.
When Mr. Drummond sat down to dinner that evening, he astonished Mattie very much by saying,—
“You can ask the Middletons, after all, for your tea-party, if you like, Mattie. What wonderful sight do you think I saw just now? Why, the colonel himself coming out from the Friary, and all the three girls were round him, chattering as though they had known him all their life; and I am pretty sure that in spite of the dark, I saw ‘son Hammond’ behind him.” And Mattie, glad of the permission, gave the invitation the next day.
Mattie grew a little alarmed as the evening approached. It 331 was her first party and she knew Archie would be critical; but Grace proved herself a useful ally.
In spite of her efforts to keep in the background and leave Mattie in her position as mistress of her brother’s house, she felt herself becoming insensibly its presiding spirit.
Archie was tolerably good-natured to Mattie; but the habits of a lifetime were too strong for him, and he still snubbed and repressed her at intervals. Mattie felt herself of no importance now that Grace had come: her duties were usurped before her eyes. Archie made a fresh demand on her forbearance every day.
“Why cannot you keep to the housekeeping, and let Grace do the schools and visitings?” he said, once. “It must come to her by and by, when you are gone; and I want her to begin as soon as possible. It will not do to let her think she has come too soon,” implying that good taste should lead Mattie to resign of her own account.
Poor Mattie! she had many a good cry in secret before that Tuesday. She could hardly help feeling pained to see how all-in-all those two were to each other, and the glad eagerness Grace threw into her work, knowing the reward of commendation she would reap. “It must be so strange never to be snubbed or scolded,—to do everything right,” Mattie thought.
Grace felt very sorry for her, and petted her a good deal. The dark little face had always a pained wistfulness on it now that touched her. She spoke kindly of Mattie to her brother on all possible occasions.
“I think Mattie is so generous in giving up to me as she does,” she observed, as Archie joined her in the drawing-room in expectation of their guests. Mattie had not yet made her appearance. She had been lighting the wax candles and trimming a refractory lamp that refused to burn, and had just run past her brother with blackened fingers and hot, tired face.