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She seemed a woman of thirty, and she wore an unbecoming walking dress of a fashion that contributed to this effect of age. Colville was aware afterward of having wished that she was really as old and plain as she looked. He had to come forward, and put on the conventional delight of a gentleman meeting lady friends. "It's remarkable how your having your eyes shut estranged you," said Mrs. Amsden.
Andy's faith was great so great that, in answer to his petitions, he fully expected to see Ethie herself at the table, when the door was opened, and he caught a view of the occupants of the dining room; but no Ethie was there, nor had been, as they said, in answer to his eager questionings. "What made you think she was here? When did she go away? Was she intending to visit me?" Mrs. Amsden asked.
Why are you going away? "No," said Colville passively; "Florence is tired of me." "You're quite sure?" "Yes; there's no mistaking one of her sex on such a point." Mrs. Amsden laughed. "Ah, a great many people mistake us, both ways. And you're really going back to America. What in the world for?" "I haven't the least idea." "Is America fonder of you than Florence?" "She's never told her love.
Amsden having gone to town with her mite, which, added to the sale of the piano, Ethie's protracted absence, Richard's return to Olney at midnight, and Harry Clifford's serious and mysterious manner, were enough to set the town in motion.
What makes you so white and queer?" his mother asked, trying to pull on her stockings, and in her trepidation jamming her toes into the heel, and drawing her shoe over the bungle thus made at the bottom of her foot. "Ethie was not there, and has not been since the night I left. She sold her piano, and took the money, and her trunk, and her clothes, and went to visit Mrs. Amsden."
"He always holds my hand when he is with me." "Does he, indeed?" exclaimed Mrs. Amsden, with a cackle. She added, "That's very polite of him, isn't it? You must be a great favourite with Mr. Colville. You will miss him when he's gone." "Yes. He's very nice." Colville and Imogene returned, coming slowly across the loose, neglected grass toward the old woman's seat. She rose as they came up.
"Now, if you had let me see you oftener in church, where people close their eyes a good deal for one purpose or another, I should have known you at once." "I hope you haven't lost a great deal of time, as it is, Mrs. Amsden," said Colville. "Of course I should have had my eyes open if I had known you were going by." "Oh, don't apologise!" cried the old thing, with ready enjoyment of his tone.
After a first motion to accompany them, Imogene sat down beside Mrs. Amsden, answering quietly the talk of the old lady, and seeming in nowise concerned about the expedition for violets. Except for a dull first glance, she did not look that way. Colville stood in the border of the grass, and the child ran quickly hither and thither in it, stooping from time to time upon the flowers.
Amsden, whose mind had been gradually clearing under the simultaneous withdrawal of Imogene and Colville from society, professed herself again as thickly clouded as a weather-glass before a storm. She appealed to the sympathy of others against this hardship. Mrs. Bowen took Colville home to dinner; Mr. Morton was coming, she said, and he must come too.
The man bade the woman not be a fool, and she asked him how she was to-endure his company if she was not a fool. Colville opened his eyes to look after them, when a voice that he knew called out, "Why, it is Mr. Colville!" It was Mrs. Amsden, and pausing with her, as if they had passed him in doubt, and arrested themselves when they had got a little way by, were Effie Bowen and Imogens Graham.
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