CHAPTER XIV.
Elizabeth was restless and uneasy the whole of the day that her mother had taken her departure for Colonel Vincent’s. The evening was wet and gloomy; the young people could not, therefore, take their usual exercise in the play-ground. After sitting some time with her sister and Miss Arden, she sauntered into the school-room, to observe how they were employed. Some of the young ladies were attending to their lessons for the following day. One party had spread the road to happiness upon a work-box; all anxious to attain the desired haven. Another young lady was seated alone, joining the map of Europe. In a corner of the room, apart from all her companions, Miss Bruce was reading the admirable instructive tale “Display.” Elizabeth looked over her shoulder, “My dear, I thought you had read that book six months ago.”
“O yes, ma’am; but I can read it over and over again: there is not a new book now in the school.”
“You mean,” said Elizabeth, smiling, “that you have read them all. But can you explain the word “Display?” for I think most young ladies are partial to it, in one shape or another.” A carriage now stopped at the door; and Elizabeth exclaimed, “who is in that carriage?” Miss Grey, who was near the window, raised herself upon a box, and looking over the blind, cried, “Mrs. Adair, ma’am, and Miss Isabella Vincent.”
Elizabeth hastened from the room, and met her mother at the hall door, joyfully exclaiming, “O, my dear mother, this is an unexpected, welcome pleasure! But how is Mrs. Vincent?”
“Composed and comfortable; the operation was performed yesterday: but it was not my intention to desert you: how could you think so?”
The truth was, Mrs. Adair had called upon the physician, and begged that he would inform her daughter that she would return in the evening: but a press of engagements had prevented his visit to Jane, who now with joy beheld her mother enter her chamber.
“I thought you would return to see me on my journey,” she exclaimed; “and you are returned, my dear mother. Blessed be this hour!”
Miss Arden and Miss Damer, from the hour they met in the summer-house, were strict friends. Their capacities were similar, and they were at the head of the different classes. On the days appointed for geography, the young ladies were in a room called the study. Miss Arden had observed that one of the servants, a respectable looking young woman, generally contrived to enter the apartment, and busy herself with one thing or another: but always looked, anxiously at the globes, or the maps, and stopped a moment to listen, either to the teacher or the pupils. Miss Arden noticed the circumstance to her friend; “I will certainly ask Catherine,” she said, “if she has any motive in attending to our pursuits; there is something in her countenance that excites my curiosity.”