The ladies had finished their breakfast; the elder of the two--that is to say, Mrs. Presty--took up her knitting and eyed her silent daughter with an expression of impatient surprise.
The personal attractions that distinguished Mrs. Linley were not derived from the short-lived beauty which depends on youth and health. Pale as she was, her face preserved its fine outline; her features had not lost their grace and symmetry of form. Presenting the appearance of a woman who had suffered acutely, she would have been more than ever (in the eyes of some men) a woman to be admired and loved.
“I seldom sleep well now,” she answered, patiently.
“You don’t give yourself a chance,” Mrs. Presty remonstrated. “Here’s a fine morning--come out for a sail on the lake. To-morrow there’s a concert in the town--let’s take tickets. There’s a want of what I call elastic power in your mind, Catherine--the very quality for which your father was so remarkable; the very quality which Mr. Presty used to say made him envy Mr. Norman. Look at your dress! Where’s the common-sense, at your age, of wearing nothing but black? Nobody’s dead who belongs to us, and yet you do your best to look as if you were in mourning.”
“I have no heart, mamma, to wear colors.”
Mrs. Presty considered this reply to be unworthy of notice. She went on with her knitting, and only laid it down when the servant brought in the letters which had arrived by the morning’s post. They were but two in number--and both were for Mrs. Linley. In the absence of any correspondence of her own, Mrs. Presty took possession of her daughter’s letters.
“One addressed in the lawyer’s handwriting,” she announced; “and one from Randal. Which shall I open for you first?”
Mrs. Presty handed it across the table. “Any news is a relief from the dullness of this place,” she said. “If there are no secrets, Catherine, read it out.”
Randal announced his arrival in London from the Continent, and his intention of staying there for a while. He had met with a friend (formerly an officer holding high rank in the Navy) whom he was glad to see again--a rich man who used his wealth admirably in the interest of his poor and helpless fellow-creatures. A “Home,” established on a new plan, was just now engaging all his attention: he was devoting himself so unremittingly to the founding of this institution that his doctor predicted injury to his health at no distant date. If it was possible to persuade him to take a holiday, Randal might return to the Continent as the traveling-companion of his friend.