No mamma any where in the house! no Sybilla! And papa looking awkward. Almost one o’clock, you see.
One by one the bouquets of bonnets re-appeared immediately upon this discovery, looking very much as if they--their owners, that is to say--knew all about it and enjoyed the _ruse_. Then followed a general leave-taking, a serious affair in Lightowler’s case, though elsewhere with merriment, and here and there with a kiss. Cabs rolled leisurely from the gate--in the last Godwin and papa: and the house was again as dark and still as those “earthly tabernacles” were doomed soon to be, upon whose front the light of youth, and love, and laughter, shone resplendently but now.
It is a sober business, riding at midnight in a musty-smelling cab; and the reactionary seriousness that oppressed both gentlemen on turning from the deserted house, seemed to increase with the odor of the straw. Very few words, upon very indifferent subjects, passed between them, as John went really _home_ for the first time; and as, on arriving there mamma was just ready to return, Mr. Lee did not alight, but drove back with his wife to their bereaved hearth, after a simple “good-night” had passed among them.
In Jessy’s early girlhood, the mother of the poor little bread-and-butter boy was a servant in her father’s house. Since the death of the woman’s husband, which was but recent, Jessy had proved her best friend--coming with cheerful gossip and “something for the baby” whenever she had an errand into town. Which she had to-day; and had hardly been seated half an hour when she became acquainted with the story of the half-crown, what the gentleman was like and who the lady, and which way they went. The boy had heard the name of the gentleman, as some one called to him, but did not perfectly recollect it: it began with a G, at any rate, and sounded like Godwin.
To the sum of sublunary happiness go many fictions--pretty figments, which, though constantly and forever disproved, are never the less believed in. Even in the contemplation of objects the most beautiful in art and nature fiction is seldom absent; and when the sun sets in clouds of purple and fine gold, it is not enough that they _are_ clouds, however gorgeous; but we must at once set about making woods, and seas, and islands of the blest, of them.