Kitabı oku: «Diana», sayfa 9

CHAPTER XIII.
FROM THE POST OFFICE

Mrs. Starling's room was like her; for use, and not for show, with some points of pride, and a general air of humble thrift. A patchwork quilt on the bed; curtains and valance of chintz; a rag carpet covering only part of the floor, the rest scrubbed clean; rush-bottomed chairs; and with those a secretary bureau of old mahogany, a dressing-glass in a dark carved frame, and a large oaken press. There were corner cupboards; a table holding work and work-basket; a spinning-wheel in a corner; a little iron stove, but no fire. Mrs. Starling lay down on her bed, simply because she was not able to sit up any longer; but she was scarcely less busy, in truth, than she had been down-stairs. Her eyes roamed restlessly from the door to the window, though with never a thought of the sweet September sunlight on the brilliant blue sky.

"Diana's queer this morning," she mused. "Yes, she was queer. What made her so mum? She was not like herself. Sailing round with her head in the clouds. And a little bit blue, too; what Diana never is; but she was to-day. What's up? I've been lying here long enough for plenty of things to happen; and she's had the house to herself. Knowlton has been here – she owned that; well, either he has been here too often, or not often enough. I'll find out which. She's thinkin' about him. Then that coffee —was it coffee, last night? I could have sworn to it; just the smell of fresh, steaming coffee. I didn't dream it. She wasn't surprised, either; she had nothing to say about it. She would have laughed at it once. And the ashes in the chimney! There's been a sight o' wood burned there, and just burned, too; they lay light, and hadn't been swep' up. There's mischief! but Diana never shall go off with that young feller; never; never! Maybe she won't have Will Flandin; but she sha'n't have him."

Mrs. Starling lay thinking and staring out of her window, till she felt she could go down-stairs again. And then she watched. But Diana had put every possible tell-tale circumstance out of the way. The very ashes were no longer where her mother could speculate upon them; pies and cakes showed no more suspiciously-cut halves or quarters; she had even been out to the barn, and found that Josiah, for reasons of his own, was making the door-latch and hinges firm and fast. It was no time now, to tell her mother her secret. Her heart was too sore to brave the rasping speech she would be certain to provoke. And with a widely different feeling, it was too rich in its prize to drag the treasure forth before scornful eyes. For this was part of Diana's experience, she found; and the feeling grew, the feeling of being rich in her secret possession; rich as she never had been before; perhaps the richer for the secresy. It was all hers, this beautiful, wonderful love that had come to her; this share in another person's heart and life; her own wholly; no one might intermeddle with her joy; she treasured it and gloated over it in the depths of her glad consciousness.

And so, as the days went by, there was no change that her mother could see in the sweet lines of her daughter's face. Nothing less sweet than usual; nothing less bright and free; if the eyes had a deeper depth at times, it was not for Mrs. Starling to penetrate; and if the childlike play of the mouth had a curve of beauty that had never until then belonged to it, the archetype of such a sign did not lie in Mrs. Starling's nature. Yet once or twice a jealous movement of suspicion did rise in her, only because Diana seemed so happy. She reasoned with herself immediately that Evan's absence could never have such an effect, if her fears were true; and that the happiness must therefore be referred to some purely innocent cause. Nevertheless, Mrs. Starling watched. For she was pretty sure that the young soldier had pushed his advances while he had been in Pleasant Valley; and he might push them still, though there no longer. She would guard what could be guarded. She watched both Diana and other people, and kept an especial eye upon all that came from the post office.

Evan had gone to a distant frontier post; the journey would take some time; and it would be several days more still, in the natural course of things, before Diana could have a letter. Diana reasoned out all that, and was not anxious. For the present, the pleasure of expecting was enough. A letter from him; it was a fairylandish, weird, wonderful pleasure, to come to her. She took to studying the newspaper, and, covertly, the map. From the map she gained a little knowledge; but the columns of the paper were barren of all allusion to the matter which was her world, and Evan's. Newspapers are very partial sometimes. She was afraid to let her mother see how eagerly she scanned them. The map and Diana had secret and more satisfactory consultations. Measuring the probable route of Evan's journey by the scale of miles; calculating the rate of progress by different modes of travel; counting the nights, and places where he might spend them; she reckoned up over and over again the days that were probably necessary to enable him to reach his post. Then she allowed margins for what she did not know, and accounted for the blanks she could not fill up; and reasoned with herself about the engrossments which might on his first arrival hinder Evan from writing – for a few hours, or a night. So at last she had constructed a scheme by which she proved to herself the earliest day at which it would do to look for a letter, and the latest to which a letter might reasonably be delayed. Women do such things. How many men are worthy of it?

That farthest limit was reached, and no letter yet.

About that time, one morning the family at Elmfield were gathered at breakfast. It was not exactly like any other breakfast table in Pleasant Valley, for a certain drift from the great waves of the world had reached it; whereas the others were clean from any such contact. The first and the third generation were represented at the table; the second was wanting; the old gentleman, the head of the family, was surrounded by only his grand-daughters. Now old Mr. Bowdoin was as simple and plain-hearted a man as all his country neighbours, if somewhat richer than most of them; he had wrought at the same labour, and grown up with the same associations. He was not more respectable than respected; generous, honest, and kindly. But the young ladies, his grandchildren, Evan's sisters, were different. They came to spend the summer with him, and they brought fancies and notions from their far-away city life, which made a somewhat incongruous mixture with the elemental simplicity of their grandfather's house. All this appeared now. The old farmer's plain strong features, his homespun dress and his bowl of milk, were at one end of the table, where he presided heartily over the fried ham and eggs. Look where you would beside, and you saw ruffled chintzes and little fly-away breakfast-caps, and fingers with jewels on them. Miss Euphemia had her tresses of long hair unbound and unbraided, hanging down her back in a style that to her grandfather savoured of barbarism; he could not be made to understand that it was a token of the highest elegance. For these ladies there was some attempt at elaborate and dainty cookery, signified by sweetbreads and a puffed omelette; and Mrs. Reverdy presided over a coffee-pot that was the wonder of the Elmfield household, and even a little matter of pride to the old squire himself; though he covered it with laughing at her mimic fires and doubtful steam engines. Gertrude Masters was still at Elmfield, the only one left of a tribe of visitors who had made the old place gay through the summer.

"I have had an invitation," said Mrs. Reverdy as she sent her grandfather his cup of coffee. And she laughed. I wish I could give the impression of this little laugh of hers, which, in company, was the attendant of most of her speeches. A little gracious laugh, with a funny air as if she were condescending, either to her subject or herself, and amused at it.

"What is it, Vevay? what invitation?" inquired her sister; while Gertrude tossed her mass of tresses from her neck, and looked as if nothing at Pleasant Valley concerned her.

"An invitation to the sewing society!" said Mrs. Reverdy. "We are all asked." And the laugh grew very amused indeed.

"What do they do?" inquired Gertrude absently.

"O, they bring their knitting at two or three o'clock, – and have a good time to tell all the news till five or six; and then they have supper, and then they put up their knitting and go home."

"What news can they have to tell at Pleasant Valley?"

"Whose hay is in first, and whose orchard will yield the most cider," said Euphemia.

"Yes; and how all their children are, and how many eggs go in a pudding."

"I don't believe they make puddings with eggs very often," said the other sister again. "Their puddings are more like hasty puddings, I fancy."

"Some of 'em make pretty good things," said old Mr. Bowdoin. "Things you can't beat, Phemie. There's Mrs. Mansfield – she's a capital housekeeper; and Mrs. Starling. She can cook."

"What do they expect you to do at the sewing meeting, Vevay?"

"Show myself, I suppose," said Mrs. Reverdy.

"Well, I guess I'd go," said her grandfather, looking at her. "It would be as good a thing as you could do."

"Go, grandpa? O, how ridiculous!" exclaimed Mrs. Reverdy, with her pretty face all wrinkled up with amusement.

"Go? yes. Why not?"

"I don't know how to knit; and I shouldn't know how to talk orchards and puddings."

"I think you had better go. It is not a knitting society, as I understand it; and I am sure you can be useful."

"Useful!" echoed Mrs. Reverdy. "It's the last thing I know how to be.

And I don't belong to the society, grandpa."

"I shouldn't like them to think that," said the old gentleman. "You belong to me; and I belong to them, my dear."

"Isn't it dreadful!" said Mrs. Reverdy in a low aside. "Now he's got this in his head – whatever am I going to do? – Suppose I invite them all to Elmfield; how would you like that, sir?" she added aloud.

"Yes, my dear, yes," said the old gentleman, pushing back his chair; for the cup of coffee was the last part of his breakfast; "it would be well done, and I should be glad of it. Ask 'em all."

"You are in for it now, Vevay," said Gertrude, when the ladies were left. "How will you manage?"

"O, I'll give them a grand entertainment and send them away delighted," said Mrs. Reverdy. "You see, grandpa wishes it; and I think it'll be fun."

"Do you suppose Evan really paid attentions to that pretty girl we saw at the blackberrying?"

"I don't know," Mrs. Reverdy answered. "He told me nothing about it. I should think Evan was crazy to do it; but men do crazy things. However, I don't believe it of him, Gerty. What nonsense!"

"I can find out, if she comes," said Miss Masters. "You'll ask her,

Genevieve?"

So it fell out that an invitation to hold the next meeting of the sewing society at Elmfield was sent to the ladies accustomed to be at such meetings; and a great stir of expectation in consequence went through all Pleasant Valley. For Elmfield, whether they acknowledged it or not, was at the top of their social tree. The invitation came in due course to Mrs. Starling's house.

It came not alone. Josiah brought it one evening on his return from the Corners, where the store and the post office were, and Mrs. Reverdy's messenger had fallen in with him and intrusted to him the note for Mrs. Starling. He handed it out now, and with it a letter of more bulk and pretensions, having a double stamp and an unknown postmark. Mrs. Starling received both and Josiah's explanations in silence, for her mind was very busy. Curious as she was to know upon what subject Mrs. Reverdy could possibly have written to her, she lingered yet with her eyes upon this other letter. It was directed to "Miss D. Starling."

"That's a man's hand," said Mrs. Starling to herself. "He's had the assurance to go and write to her, I do believe!"

She stood looking at it, doubtful, suspicious, uneasy; then turned into the dairy for fear Diana might surprise her, while she opened Mrs. Reverdy's note. She had a vague idea that both epistles might relate to the same subject. But this one was innocent enough, at least. Hiding the large letter in her bosom, she came back and gave the invitation to Diana, whose foot she had heard.

"At Elmfield! What an odd thing! Will you go, mother?"

"I always go, don't I? What's the reason I shouldn't go now?"

"I didn't know whether you would like to go there."

"What if I don't? No, I don't care particularly about goin' to Elmfield; they're a kind o' stuck up folks; but I'll go to let them see that I ain't."

There was silence for a little; then Mrs. Starling broke it by inquiring if Diana had finished her chintz gown. Diana had.

"I'd wear it, if I was you."

"Why, mother?"

"Let 'em see that other folks can dress as well as them."

"O, mother, my dresses are nothing alongside of theirs."

"What's the reason they ain't?" inquired Mrs. Starling, looking incredulous.

"Their things are beautiful, mother; more costly a great deal; and fashionable. We can't make things so in Pleasant Valley. We don't know how."

"I don't see any sense in that," rejoined Mrs. Starling. "One fashion's as good as another. Anyhow, there's better-lookin' folks in Pleasant Valley than ever called themselves Bowdoin, or Knowlton either. So be as smart as you can, Diana. I guess you needn't be ashamed of yourself."

Diana thought of nothing less. Indeed she thought little about her appearance. While she was putting on her bright chintz dress, there was perhaps a movement of desire that she might seem pleasant in the eyes of Evan's people – something that he need not be ashamed of; but her heart was too full of richer thoughts to have much room for such as these. For Evan had chosen her; Evan loved her; the secret bond between them nothing on earth could undo; and any day now that first letter of his might arrive, which her eyes were bright only to think of looking upon. Poor Diana! that letter was jammed up within the bones of Mrs. Starling's stays.

CHAPTER XIV.
A MEETING AT ELMFIELD

It was one of the royal days of a New England autumn; the air clear and bracing and spicy; the light golden and glowing, and yet softened to the dreamiest, richest, most bounteous aureole of hope, by a slight impalpable haze; too slight to veil anything, but giving its tender flattery to the landscape nevertheless. And through that to the mind. Who can help but receive it? Suggestions of waveless peace, of endless delight, of a world-full glory that must fill one's life with riches, come through such a light and under such a sky. Diana's life was full already; but she took the promise for all the years that stretched out in the future. The soft autumn sky where the clouds were at rest, having done their work, bore no symbol of the storms that might come beneath the firmament; the purple and gold and crimson of nature's gala dress seemed to fling their soft luxury around the beholder, enfolding him, as it were, from all the dust and the dimness and the dullness of this world's working days for evermore. So it was to Diana; and all the miles of that long drive, joggingly pulled along by Prince, she rode in a chariot of the imagination, traversing fields of thought and of space, now to Evan and now with him; and in her engrossment spoke never a word from the time she mounted into the waggon till they came in sight of Elmfield. And Mrs. Starling had her own subjects for thought, and was as silent on her part. She was thinking all the way what she should do with that letter. Suppose things had gone too far to be stopped? But Diana had told her nothing; she was not bound to know by guess-work. And if this were the beginning of serious proposals, then it were better known to but herself only. She resolved finally to watch Diana and the Elmfield people this afternoon; she could find out, she thought, whether there were any matter of common interest between them. With all this, Mrs. Starling's temper was not sweetened.

Elmfield was a rare place. Not by the work of art or the craft of the gardener at all; for a cunning workman had never touched its turf or its plantations. Indeed it had no plantations, other than such as were intended for pure use and profit; great fields of Indian corn, and acres of wheat and rye, and a plot of garden cabbages. Mrs. Reverdy's power of reform had reached only the household affairs. But the corn and the rye and the cabbages were out of sight from the immediate home field; and there the grace of nature had been so great that one almost forgot to wish that anything had been added to it. A little river swept, curving in sweet leisure, through a large level tract of greenest meadows. In front of one of these large curves the house stood, but well back, so that the meadow served instead of a lawn. It had no foreign beauties of tree growth to adorn it, nor needed them; for along the bank of the river, from space to space, irregularly, rose a huge New England elm, giving the shelter of its canopy of branches to a wide spot of turf. The house added nothing to the scene, beyond the human interest; it was just a large old farmhouse, nothing more; draped, however, and half covered up by other elms and a few fir trees. But in front of it lay this wide, sunny, level meadow, with the wilful little stream meandering through, with the stately old trees spotting it and breaking its monotony; and in the distance a soft outline of hills, not too far away, and varied enough to be picturesque, rounded in the whole picture. A picture one would stand long to look at; thoroughly New England and characteristic; gentle, homelike, lovely, with just a touch of wildness, intimating that you were beyond the rules of conventionality. Being New England folk themselves, Mrs. Starling and Diana of course would not read some of these features. They only thought it was a "fine place."

Long before they got there this afternoon, before anybody got there, the ladies of the family gathered upon the wide old piazza.

"It's as a good as a play," said Gertrude Masters. "I never saw such society in my life, and I am curious to know what they will be like."

"You have seen them in church," said Euphemia.

"Yes, but they all feel poky there. I can't tell anything by that.

Besides, I don't hear them talk. There's somebody now!"

"Too fast for any of our good sewing friends," said Mrs. Reverdy; "and there is no waggon. It's Mr. Masters, Gerty! How he does ride; and yet he sits as if he was upon a rocking-horse."

"I don't think he'd sit very quiet upon a rocking-horse," said Gerty. And then she lifted up her voice and shouted musically a salutation to the approaching rider.

He alighted presently at the foot of the steps, and throwing the bridle over his horse's head, joined the party.

"So delighted!" said Mrs. Reverdy graciously. "You are come just in time to help us take care of the people."

"Are you going to entertain the nation?" asked Mr Masters.

"Only Pleasant Valley," Mrs. Reverdy answered with her little laugh; which might mean amusement at herself or condescension to Pleasant Valley. "Do you think they will be hard to entertain?"

"I can answer for one," said the minister. "And looking at what there is to see from here, I could almost answer for them all." He was considering the wide sunlit meadow, where the green and the gold, yea, and the very elm shadows, as well as the distant hills, were spiritualized by the slight soft haze.

"Why, what is there to see, Basil?" inquired his cousin Gertrude.

"The sky."

"You don't think that is entertaining, I hope? If you were a polite man, you would have said something else."

She was something to see herself, in one sense, and the something was pretty, too; but very self-conscious. From her flow of curly tresses down to the rosettes on her slippers, every inch of her showed it. Now the best dressing surely avoids this effect; while there is some, and not bad dressing either, which proclaims it in every detail. The crinkles of Gertrude's hair were crisp with it; her French print dress, beautiful in itself, was made with French daintiness and worn with at least equal coquettishness; her wrists bore two or three bracelets both valuable and delicate; and Gertrude's eyes, pretty eyes too, were audacious with the knowledge of all this. Audacious in a sweet, secret way, understand; they were not bold eyes, openly. Her cousin looked her over, with a glance quite recognisant of all I have described, yet destitute of a shade of compliment or even of admiration; very clear and very cool.

"Basil, you don't say all you think!" exclaimed the young lady.

"Not always," said her cousin. "We have it on Solomon's authority, that a 'fool uttereth all his mind. A wise man keepeth it till afterwards.'"

"What are you keeping?"

But the answer was interrupted by Mrs. Reverdy.

"Where shall we put them, do you think, Mr. Masters? I'm quite anxious. Here, on the verandah, do you think? – or on the green, where we mean to have supper? or would it be better to go into the house?"

"As a general principle, Mrs. Reverdy, I object to houses. When you can, keep out of them. So I say. And there comes one of your guests. I will take my horse out of the road."

Mrs. Reverdy objected and protested and ran to summon a servant, but the minister had his way and led his horse off to the stable. While he was gone, the little old green waggon which brought Miss Barry came at a soft jog up the drive and stopped before the door. Mrs. Reverdy came flying out and then down the steps to help her alight.

"It's a long ways to your place, Mis' Reverdy; I declare, I'm kind o' stiff," said the old lady as she mounted to the piazza. There she stood still and surveyed the prospect. And her conclusion burst forth in an unequivocal, "Ain't it elegant!"

"I am delighted you like it," said Mrs. Reverdy with her running laugh.

"Won't you sit down?"

"I hain't got straightened out yet, after drivin' the horse so long. It does put me in a kind o' cramp, somehow, to drive, – 'most allays."

"Is the horse so hard-mouthed?"

"La! bless you, I never felt of his mouth. He don't do nothin'; I don't expect he would do nothin'; but I allays think he's a horse, and there's no tellin'."

"That's very true," said Mrs. Reverdy, the laugh of condescending acquiescence mingled with a little sense of fun now. "But do sit down; you'll be tired standing."

"There's Mrs. Flandin's waggin, I guess, comin'; she was 'most ready when I come by. Is this your sister?" – looking at Gertrude.

"No, the other is my sister. This is Miss Masters; a cousin of your minister."

"I thought she was, maybe, – your sister, I mean, – because she had her hair the same way. Ain't it very uncomfortable?" This to Gertrude.

"It is very comfortable," said the young lady; "except in hot weather."

"Don't say it is!" quoth Miss Barry, looking at the astonishing hair while she got out her needles. "Seems to me I should feel as if my hair never was combed."

"Not if it was combed, would you?" said Gertrude gravely.

"Well, yes; seems to me I should. I allays liked to have my hair sleeked up as tight as I could get it; and then I knowed there warn't none of it flyin'. But la! it's a long time since I was young, and there's new fashions. Is the minister your cousin?"

"Yes. How do you like him?"

"I hain't got accustomed to him yet," said the little old lady, clicking her needles with a considerate air. "He ain't like Mr. Hardenburgh, you see; and Mr. Hardenburgh was the minister afore him."

"What was the difference?"

"Well – Mr. Hardenburgh, you could tell he was a minister as fur as you could see him; he had that look. Now Mr. Masters hain't; he's just like other folks; only he's more pleasant than most."

"Oh, he is more pleasant, is he?"

"Well, seems to me he is," said the little old lady. "It allays makes me feel kind o' good when he comes alongside. He's cheerful. Mr. Hardenburgh was a good man, but he made me afeard of him; he was sort o' fierce, in the pulpit and out o' the pulpit. Mr. Masters ain't nary one."

"Do you think he's a good preacher, then?" said Gertrude demurely, bending over to look at Miss Barry's knitting.

"Well, I do!" said the old lady. "There! I ain't no judge; but I love to sit and hear him. 'Tain't a bit like a minister, nother, though it's in church; he just speaks like as I am speakin' to you; but he makes the Bible kind o' interestin'."

It was very well for Gertrude that Mrs. Carpenter now came to take her seat on the piazza, and the conversation changed. She had got about as much as she could bear. And after Mrs. Carpenter came a crowd; Mrs. Flandin, and Mrs. Mansfield, and Miss Gunn, and all the rest, with short interval, driving up and unloading and joining the circle on the piazza; which grew a very wide circle indeed, and at last broke up into divisions. Gertrude was obliged to suspend operations for a while, and use her eyes instead of her tongue. Most of the rest were inclined to do the same; and curious glances went about in every direction, not missing Miss Masters herself. Some people were absolutely tongue-tied; others used their opportunity.

"Don't the wind come drefful cold over them flats in winter?" asked one good lady who had never been at Elmfield before. Mrs. Reverdy's running little laugh was ready with her answer.

"I believe it does; but we are never here in winter. It's too cold."

"Your gran'ther's here, ain't he?" queried Mrs. Salter.

"Yes, O yes; grandpa is here, of course. I don't suppose anything would draw him away from the old place."

"How big is the farm?" went on the first speaker.

Mrs. Reverdy did not know; three or four hundred acres, she believed.

Or it might be five. She did not know the difference!

"I guess your father misses you when you all go away," remarked Mrs.

Flandin, who had hardly spoken, at least aloud.

The reply was prevented, for Mrs. Starling's waggon drew up at the foot of the steps, and Mrs. Reverdy hastened down to give her assistance to the ladies in alighting. Gertrude also suspended what she was saying, and gave her undivided attention to the view of Diana.

She was only a country girl, Miss Masters said to herself. Yet what a lovely figure, as she stood there before the waggon; perfectly proportioned, light and firm in action or attitude, with the grace of absolute health and strength and faultless make. More; there always is more to it; and Gertrude felt that without in the least having power to reason about it; felt in the quiet pose and soft motion those spirit indications of calm and strength and gracious dignity, which belonged to the fair proportions and wholesome soundness of the inward character. The face said the same thing when it was turned, and Diana came up the steps; though it was seen under a white sun-bonnet only; the straight brows, the large quiet eyes, the soft creamy colour of the skin, all testified to the fine physical and mental conditions of this creature. And Gertrude felt as she looked that it would not have been very surprising if Evan Knowlton or any other young officer had lost his heart to her. But she isn't dressed, thought Gertrude; and the next moment a shadow crossed her heart as Diana's sun-bonnet came off, and a wealth of dark hair was revealed, knotted into a crown of nature's devising, which art could never outdo. "I'll find out about Evan," said Miss Masters to herself.

She had to wait. The company was large now, and the buzz of tongues considerable; though nothing like what had been in Mrs. Starling's parlour. So soon as the two new-comers were fairly seated and at work, Mrs. Flandin took up the broken thread of her discourse.

"Ain't your father kind o' lonesome here in the winters, all by himself?"

"My grandfather, you mean?" said Mrs. Reverdy,

"I mean your grandfather. I forget you ain't his own; but it makes no difference. Don't he want you to hum all the year round?"

"I daresay he would like it."

"He's gettin' on in years now. How old is Squire Bowdoin?"

"I don't know," said Mrs. Reverdy. "He's between seventy and eighty, somewhere."

"You won't have him long with you."

"O, I hope so!" said Mrs. Reverdy lightly, and with the unfailing laugh which went with everything; "I think grandpa is stronger than I am. I shouldn't wonder if he'd outlive me."

"Still, don't you think it is your duty to stay with him?"

Mrs. Reverdy laughed again. "I suppose we don't always do our duty," she said. "It's too cold here in the winter – after October or September – for me."

"Then it is not your duty to be here," said her sister Euphemia, somewhat distinctly. But Mrs. Flandin was bound to "free her mind" of what was upon it.

"I should think the Squire'd want Evan to hum," she went on.

"It would be very nice if Evan could be in two places at once," Mrs.

Reverdy owned conciliatingly.

"Where is Captain Knowlton now?" asked Mrs. Boddington.

"O, he is not a captain yet," said Mrs. Reverdy. "He is only a lieutenant. I don't know when he'll get any higher than that. He's a great way off – on the frontier – watching the Indians."

"I should think it was pleasanter work to watch sheep," said Mrs.

Flandin "Don't it make you feel bad to have him away so fur?"

"O, we're accustomed to having him away, you know; Evan has never been at home; we really don't know him as well as strangers do. We have just got a letter from him at his new post."

They had got a letter from him! Two bounds Diana's heart made: the first with a pang of pain that they should have the earliest word; the next with a pang of joy, at the certainty that hers must be lying in the post office for her. The blood flowed and ebbed in her veins with the violent action of extreme excitement. Yet nature did for this girl what only the practice and training of society do for others; she gave no outward sign. Her head was not lifted from her work; the colour of her cheek did not change; and when a moment after she found Miss Masters at her side, and heard her speaking, Diana looked and answered with the utmost seeming composure.