"O no, Miss Fleda! I suppose he's in Philadelphy but his motions is so little to be depended on, that I never know when I have him; maybe he'll stop going through to Boston, and maybe no, and I don't know when; so anyhow I had to have a fire made, and this room all ready; and aint it lucky it was ready for you to-night? and now he aint here, you can have the great chair all to yourself, and make yourself comfortable we can keep warmer here, I guess, than you can in the country," said the good housekeeper, giving some skilful admonishing touches to the fire; "and you must just sit there and read and rest, and see if you can't get back your old looks again. If I thought it was that you came for, I'd be happy. I never did see such a change in any one in five days."
She stood looking down at her guest with a face of very serious concern, evidently thinking much more than she chose to give utterance to.
"I am tired, Mrs. Pritchard," said Fleda, smiling up at her.
"I wish you had somebody to take care of you, Miss Fleda, that wouldn't let you tire yourself. It's a sin to throw your strength away so and you don't care for looks, nor nothing else when it's for other people. You're looking just as handsome, too, for all," she said, her mouth giving way a little, as she stooped down to take off Fleda's overshoes; "but that's only because you can't help it. Now, what is there you'd like to have for supper? just say, and you shall have it whatever would seem best because I mightn't hit the right thing."
Fleda declared her indifference to everything but a cup of tea, and her hostess bustled away to get that, and tax her own ingenuity and kindness for the rest. And, leaning her weary head back in the lounge, Fleda tried to think but it was not time yet; she could only feel feel what a sad change had come over her since she had sat there last shut her eyes and wish she could sleep again.
But Mrs. Pritchard's hospitality must be gone through with first.
The nicest of suppers was served in the bright little parlour, and her hostess was a compound of care and good-will; nothing was wanting to the feast but a merry heart. Fleda could not bring that, so her performance was unsatisfactory, and Mrs. Pritchard was distressed. Fleda went to her own room, promising better doings to-morrow.
She awoke in the morning to the full burden of care and sorrow which sheer weakness and weariness the day before had in part laid down to a quicker sense of the state of things than she had had yet. The blasting evil that had fallen upon them Fleda writhed on her bed when she thought of it. The sternest, cruellest, most inflexible grasp of distress. Poverty may be borne, death may be sweetened, even to the survivors; but disgrace Fleda hid her head, as if she would shut the idea out with the light. And the ruin it had wrought! Affection killed at the root her aunt's happiness withered for this world Hugh's life threatened the fair name of his family gone the wear and weariness of her own spirit but that had hardly a thought. Himself! oh! no one could tell what a possible wreck, now that self-respect and the esteem of others those two safeguards of character were lost to him. "So much security has any woman in a man without religion;" she remembered those words of her aunt Miriam now; and she thought, if Mr. Thorn had sought an ill wind to blow, upon his pretensions, he could not have pitched them better. What fairer promise, without religion, could be than her uncle had given! Reproach had never breathed against his name, and no one less than those who knew him best could fancy that he had ever given it occasion. And who could have more at stake? and the stake was lost that was the summing up thought.
No, it was not for Fleda's mind presently sprang beyond to the remedy; and after a little swift and earnest flitting about of thought over feasibilities and contingencies, she jumped up, and dressed herself with a prompt energy which showed a mind made up to its course. And yet when she came down to the parlour, though bending herself with nervous intentness to the work she had to do, her fingers and her heart were only stayed in their trembling by some of the happy assurances she had been fleeing to