Mrs. Yorke sat in a front window holding an embroidery-frame, and Edith occupied a stool at her feet. The child had told all her story; her recollections of her mother, her life with the Rowans, of Captain Cary, and her ring. But of Mr. Rowan's burial she said nothing. That was to remain a secret with those who had assisted.
When Mrs. Yorke occasionally dropped her work, and sat looking out at her husband and son, Edith caressed the hand lying idly on that glowing wool, and held her own slender brown fingers beside those fair ones, for a contrast. She could not enough admire her aunt's snow-drop delicacy, rich hair, and soft eyes.
Mr. Yorke was too much engrossed to notice his wife; but Carl looked up now and then for a glance and smile.
"Do you recollect anything that happened when you were a little girl, Aunt Amy?" Edith asked.
The lady smiled and sighed in the same breath. "I was this moment thinking of a tea-party I had on that large rock you can just see at the right. I had heard my father read Midsummer-Night's Dream, and my fancy was captivated by it. So I invited Titania, Oberon, and all the fairies, and they came. It was an enchanting banquet. The plates were acorn-cups, the knives and forks were pine-needles, the cakes were white pebbles, and we drank drops of dew out of moss vases."
"I've read that play too," Edith said brightly. "Mr. Rowan had it. And I read about Ariel. But I didn't like Caliban nor Bottom, and I think it was a shame to cheat Titania so. Do you remember anything else?"
"Yes. When I was five or six years old, my father brought home a new map of the State of Maine, and hung it on that wall opposite. It was bright and shining, and had the name in great letters across the whole. My father held me up before it in his arms, and said I should have a silver quarter if I would tell him what the great letters spelt. How I tried! not so much for the silver, though I wanted it, as for the honor of success, and to please my father. But I couldn't make less than two syllables of it. To me M, A, I, N, E, spelt Mainé. But my father gave me the quarter. I suppose he thought that the language, and not I, was at fault."
"I don't see why letters should be put into words when they are not needed there," Edith remarked. "I would like to have them left out. It makes a bother, and takes time."
The child did not know that she was uttering revolutionary sentiments, and that the reddest of red republicanism lurked in her speech.