CHAPTER VIII.

AFTER THE DINNER.


The carriage which took Hannah home also took Miss McPherson to the door
of her dwelling, a large, old-fashioned New England house, with a wide
hall through the center, and a square room on either side; one the
drawing-room or parlor in which the massive furniture had not been
changed during the twenty years and more that Miss Betsey had lived
there; the other the living room where the lady sat, and ate, and
received her friends and where now a bright fire was burning in the
Franklin stove, and the kettle was singing upon the hob, while a little
round Swiss table was standing on the Persian rug before the fire, and
on it the delicate cup and saucer, and sugar bowl, and creamer, which
Miss McPherson had herself bought at Sevres years ago, when the life she
looked forward to was very different from what had actually come to her.
Possibly the memory of the day when she walked through those brilliant
rooms at Sevres, and bought her costly wares, softened a little her
somewhat harsh, uncompromising nature, for there was a very womanly
expression on her usually severe face as she sipped her favorite oolong,
and gazed dreamily into the fire, where she seemed to see again the
sweet face of the child who had talked to her on the shores of Cardigan
Bay, and whose innocent prattle had by turns amused, and interested, and
enraged her. And, as she gazed she thought:

"Yes, Grey was right. Why didn't I take the little thing in my arms and
bring her home with me? To think of her being hungry, when there is
enough wasted in this house every day to feed her! And why did I so far