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Richards, who had purposely stopped for the day in Albany, smoked his expensive cigars, ordered oysters and wine sent to his room the very one adjoining Adah's made two or three calls, wrote an explanatory note to 'Lina feeling half tempted to leave out the "Dear," with which he felt constrained to preface it thought again of Lily poor Lily, as he always called her thought once of the strange woman and the little boy, in whom Irving Stanley had been so interested, wondered where they were going, and who it was the boy looked a little like thought somehow of Anna in connection with that boy; and then, late in the afternoon, sauntered down to the Boston depot, and took his seat in the car, which, at about ten o'clock that night would deposit him at Snowdon.
This precious relic was put by the heedless boy to the base use of serving as a tail to a kite, and during one of the high winds the kite blew away, and there was an end to Adah's most precious possession! Thus perished the link that united Adah to the sweetest dream of her maturer years. However, this mishap did not wholly abate Adah's interest in our affairs.
"Yes, she said she would bring it to you," was Adah's reply. For several minutes Anna sat looking out upon the snowy landscape, her usually smooth brow wrinkled with thought, and her eyes gleaming with a strange, new light. There was a shadow on her fair face, a grieved, injured expression, as if her mother's treachery had hurt her cruelly.
"You must pray more than once, child; pray many, many times," was Adah's reply; whereupon Mug looked aghast, for the idea of praying a second time had never entered her brain. Still, if she must, why, she must, and she stole quietly from the kitchen.
The question brought into Adah's eyes a fearful look of anguish, but she did not answer, and the doctor spoke again. "Have I found Lily only to lose her?" Still there was no reply, and the doctor continued: "You are my wife, Adah. No power can undo that, save death, and you are my child's mother. For Willie's sake, oh, Adah, for Willie's sake, forgive."
Many and minute were Alice's inquiries as to whether Adah had yet seen Dr. Richards, when was he expected home, and so forth. Adah placed her letter in her pocket, and then went to sit with Anna, whose face lighted up at once, for Adah's society was like sunshine to her monotonous life.
But Hugh was not thinking of that night which ruined Adah, and Alice's description awakened no suspicion. She saw it did not, and thought once to tell him frankly all she feared, but was deterred from doing so by a feeling that possibly she might be wrong in her conjectures. Adah's presence at Terrace Hill would set that matter right, and she asked if Hugh did not think it best for her to go.
"Courage, mother," she whispered again, and then advanced into the room, growing bolder at every step, for with one rapid glance she had swept the hall, and felt that amid that bevy of beauty and fashion there were few more showy than 'Lina Worthington in her rustling dress of green, with Ellen Tiffton's bracelet on one arm and the one bought with Adah's money on the other.
I was greatly pleased, and felt that the wealthy banker and his sister could find no fault with Adah's connections. She greeted me the next morning like the sister she had become in very truth. "Oh, Richard!" she exclaimed, "I'm so glad to see thee. Why! thee's so improved I'd hardly know thee. Seems to me thee's grown taller and larger every way."
Their friendship extended through the blissful years of their early wedded life. And at the present time they are as dear to each other as of yore. Adah presupposes that everybody else knows who Maria is, and so everybody is regaled perennially with Adah's loyal tributes to Maria's transcendent virtues. I have an instance just at hand.
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