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Updated: June 5, 2025
Van Buren's letter in his hand, wondering why Ethie had withheld the knowledge of it from him, and if she had outlived the love which her aunt regretted as having come to naught.
It would only be a fair return, he reflected, for all the Caudles he had listened to so patiently, and duly strengthened for his task by his mother's remark to James, accidentally overheard, "Altogether too fine a lady for us. I wonder what Richard was thinking of," he mounted the stairs resolved at least to talk with Ethie and ask her to do better.
With ready tact the ladies saw that something was wrong, and kindly forbore further remarks, except to tell what a grand affair it was, and how much she was missed. But Ethie detected in their manner an unspoken sympathy or pity, which exasperated and humiliated her more than open words would have done.
But that, she reasoned, would be needless expense. Since the night Richard spent there, five years ago, no one had slept there, and no one should sleep there, either, till Ethie came back again. "Till Ethie comes again."
It seemed a great deal worse when put into words, and the whole expression of Richard's face was changed when he had finished speaking, while he was conscious of feeling much as he did that night when he denounced Ethie so terribly to her face. "Had it been a man, or half a man, or anybody besides that contemptible puppy, it would not seem so bad; but to forsake me for him!"
Ethie had thought so herself, wishing sometimes that she had a larger instrument, which was better adapted to the present style of music, but she could not bring herself to part with Aunt Barbara's present. Now, however, the case was different. Money she must have, and as she scorned to take it from the bank, where her check was always honored, she would sell her piano.
"Upon my word, I would not have recognized you," she said, sitting down upon the bed and looking Ethie fully in the face. Aunt Barbara, thinking her sister might like to have Ethie alone for a little, had purposely left the room, and so Mrs. Van Buren was free to say what she pleased. She had felt a good deal of irritation toward Ethie for some time past.
He did not think proper to explain either to his mother or Ethie that this was his second serious entanglement, and that the ring had been bought before for a pretty milliner girl, at least six years his senior, whose acquaintance he had made at Nahant the summer previous, and whom he had forgotten when he learned that to her taste his mother was indebted for the stylish bonnet she sported every season.
Van Buren sat cooling herself and reading "Vanity Fair," there was a tiny ring on Ethelyn's finger, and she had pledged herself to be Frank's wife some day in the future. Frank had promised to tell his mother, for Ethelyn would have no concealment; and so, holding up her hand and pointing to the ring, he said, more in jest than earnest: "Look, mother, Ethie and I are engaged.
There was much good cheer and merriment there, and Ethie, in her rich crimson silk which Richard had surprised her with, was the queen of all, her wishes deferred to, and her tastes consulted with a delicacy and deference which no one could fail to observe.
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