The lady soon entered. It was eight years since we had met, but time had touched her gently. Her face wore its old, decided, yet quiet expression, and her manner showed the easy self-possession I had noticed at our first interview. She was richly dressed, and had on a heavy satin pelisse, and a blue velvet bonnet, as if about to ride out.
When the usual greetings were over, she remarked:
'You have been here some time, sir?'
'Yes, madam; we arrived about two hours ago; but I met some old friends outside, and the pleasure of seeing them has made me a little tardy in paying my respects to you.'
'The negroes, you mean, sir,' she replied, with a slight toss of the head, and a look of cool dignity which well became her.
'Yes, madam. I have many friends among the blacks. On many plantations they look for my coming as they do for Christmas.'
'It is quite rare to find a white gentleman so fond of negroes,' she rejoined, with an air slightly more supercilious.
I remembered her as the humble schoolmistress, whose entire possessions were packed in one trunk; and, forgetting myself, said, in a tone which bore a slight trace of indignation:
'More rare, I fear, than it should be; and you and I, madam, who are Yankees, and have 'worked for a living,' surely cannot despise the negroes because they are compelled to work for theirs.'
'Oh! no, sir! not by any means! But you must excuse me; the carriage is waiting to take me to church;' and, rising, she bowed herself stiffly out of the door.