sisters.

So went a day rich in fair dreams to the ladies; and at the hour of their
father's return they walked across the parvenu park, in a state of
enthusiasm for Besworth, that threw some portion of its decorative light
on the, donor of Besworth. When his carriage was heard on the road, they
stood fast, and greeted his appearance with a display of pocket-
handkerchiefs in the breeze, a proceeding that should have astonished
him, being novel; but seemed not to do so, for it was immediately
responded to by the vigorous waving of a pair of pocket-handkerchiefs
from the carriage-window! The ladies smiled at this piece of simplicity
which prompted him to use both his hands, as if one would not have been
enough. Complacently they continued waving. Then Adela looked at her
sisters; Cornelia's hand dropped and Arabella, the last to wave, was the
first to exclaim: "That must be a woman's arm!"

The carriage stopped at the gate, and it was one in the dress of a woman
at least, and of the compass of a big woman, who descended by the aid of
Mr. Pole. Safely alighted, she waved her pocket-handkerchief afresh.
The ladies of Brookfield did not speak to one another; nor did they move
their eyes from the object approaching. A simultaneous furtive
extinction of three pocket-handkerchiefs might have been noticed. There
was no further sign given.




CHAPTER XV

A letter from Brookfield apprised Wilfrid that Mr. Pole had brought Mrs.