Twice a year, on fine days in spring and fall, Aunt Griselda's bombazine
dresses were taken from the whitewashed closet and hung out to air upon
the clothesline at the back of the house, while pungent odours of tar
and camphor were exhaled from the full black folds. On these days Aunt
Griselda would remain in her room, sorting faded relics which she took
from a cedar chest and spread beside her on the floor. The door was kept
locked at such times, but once Eugenia, who had gone with Congo to carry
Aunt Griselda her toast and tea, had caught a glimpse of a yellowed
swiss muslin frock and the leather case of a daguerreotype containing
the picture of a round-eyed girl with rosy cheeks. Aunt Griselda had
hidden them hastily away at the child's entrance--hidden them with that
nervous, awkward haste which dreads a dawning jest of itself; but
Eugenia had seen that her old eyes were red and her voice more rasping
than usual.

Sixty years ago Aunt Griselda had had her romance, and she still kept
her love-letters tied up with discoloured ribbons and laid away in the
cedar chest. It was but the skeleton of a love story--the adolescent
ardours of a high-spirited country girl and the high-spirited son of a
neighbouring farmer. When the quarrel came the letters were overlooked
when the ring went back. Griselda Grigsby had tossed them carelessly
into the cedar chest and gone out to forget them. Her heart had not
been deeply touched and it soon mended. No other lovers came, and she
lived her quiet life in her father's house, gathering garden flowers for
the great, blue bowls in the parlour, teaching the catechism to small
black slaves, and making stiff, old-fashioned samplers in crewels. The
high-spirited lover had loved elsewhere and died of a fever, and, beyond
a passing regret, she thought little of him. There were nearer
interests, and she was still the petted daughter of her father's