Edith drew back, and stood up, turning to Carl.
“There! she is angry the first thing,” the old lady cried. “No danger of anybody’s thinking her sans épines. Take her down to get some breakfast, Carl.”
“Dick Rowan is here,” Edith said, as the two went down-stairs; “and he is a Catholic; and he has a new ship which he has named for me.”
There was no reply. They were going through the shady entry, and, if the young man frowned at the news, the frown was not seen.
“Aunt Amy has gone to Hester’s,” Edith went on. “She got over the journey nicely, and wants
to see you very soon. She will send Hester up to see me presently. I am too tired to go out to-day, would you believe it? You see, travel was so new to me that I could not sleep. I stayed on deck as long as I could, then I listened all night. It seemed so strange to be on the water, out of sight of land.”
Later, while the young traveller was resting in the chamber assigned her, a visitor entered gently, unannounced. “I thought I might come, dear,” Miss Mills said.
Edith raised herself, and eagerly held out her arms. The lady embraced her tenderly, then dropped, rather than sat down, in a chair by the bed. She looked with a strange mingling of feelings on this child of her lost lover. When she recognized the tint of his hair and eyes in Edith’s, she bent toward her with yearning love; but then appeared some trait of the mother—a turn of the head, a smile unconsciously proud, an exquisitely fine outline of feature; and, at sight of it, that wounded heart shrank back as from a deadly enemy. The interview was friendly, and even tender, and engagements were made for future meetings; but the lady was glad to get away. The sight of Robert Yorke’s child had wakened all the sleeping past, and for a time the years that had intervened since her parting with him faded like a mist. Since that day, more than one power, at first pride, later religion, had strengthened her, had raised up new hopes and new joys; but they were not the sweet human hopes and joys that every man and woman looks naturally for; they were those born of struggle and self-denial. She had lived truly and nobly, but she was human; and to-day her humanity rose, and swept over her like a flood.
Miss Mills locked herself into her
room, and for once gave herself up to regret. It was no ordinary affection which she mourned. It had entered her heart silently, and been welcomed like an angel visitant; it had been held sacred. She had watched it with awe and delight as it grew, that strange, beautiful, terrible power! How complex it had become, entering into every feeling, every interest! How it had changed and given a new meaning to life, and a new idea and comprehension of herself!