Barbara bore off Ruth to share her bed. Jessamy called back Phyllis, who was following them, stopping herself to turn off the gas. "Phyl," she said, "do you know why Mr. Lane came here to-night?"
"Apparently to see you," returned Phyllis. "He hardly noticed any one else."
"Yes; but it was to tell me something particular," said Jessamy, with the suspicion of a blush in the dim light. "He thinks--oh, Phyl, he really thinks that the information he has in regard to Mr. Abbott's actions two years ago is going to get us back some of our money; and he says Mr. Hurd thinks so too. Isn't it fine?"
"Oh, Jessamy, wouldn't I be thankful! But not for my own sake," added Phyllis, hastily. "Mr. Lane seems to be very nice, Amy."
"So are both your friends very nice, Phyllis," returned Jessamy, turning out the gas, as she spoke, so Phyllis could not see her face.
While Phyllis was climbing the steep hill of fame by the path of her little stories, events in her home were not at a standstill.
The pleasantest and most tangible thing that had happened was that Jessamy had been asked by the editor of the magazine which had bought her illustrations and Phyllis's two stories, to illustrate for him other work besides that done by her cousin.
Jessamy was very busy and happy during these days. She was blossoming out into fuller, more perfect beauty; her eyes were alight as with a secret joy, her smile grew every day sweeter and more lingering; in a word, Jessamy was leaving the last shadow of that mysterious valley of young maidenhood, and passing into the full sunshine of womanhood. It was two years since the trouble, which was every day less of a regret to the Wyndhams, had come to them; or, it would be two years when May rolled around again, and it was then March. Jessamy and Phyllis were twenty; they had a right to enter upon their kingdom. Barbara, too, at nineteen and engaged, was grown up. Mrs. Wyndham, with the gratitude of a mother who had brought her children safely through the development of character into sweet and good women, yet with the regret of a mother in losing her little girls, realized that her three little maids were little no longer.
It was March, and the season was forward after the heavy snows of the winter. The song-sparrow was lilting in the park, the twigs and buds were showing red and swelling on many trees and shrubs.