Need we say that childish prayer was answered to the letter!




CHAPTER V.

ROSE HILL.


A little way out of the village of Dunwood, and situated upon a
slight eminence, was a large, handsome building, which had
formerly been owned by a Frenchman, who, from the great profusion
of roses growing upon his grounds, had given to the place the name
of "Rose Hill." Two years before our story opens, the Frenchman
died, and since that time Rose Hill had been unoccupied, but now
it had another proprietor, and early in the summer Mr. Howard
Hastings and lady would take possession of their new home.

Of Mr. Hastings nothing definite was known, except that he was a
man of unbounded wealth and influence--"and a little peculiar
withal," so said Mrs. Leah, the matron, who had come up from New
York to superintend the arrangement of the house, which was fitted
up in a style of elegance far surpassing what most of Dunwood's
inhabitants had seen before, and was for two or three weeks thrown
open to the public. Mrs. Leah, who was a servant in Mr. Hastings's
family and had known her young mistress's husband from childhood,
was inclined to be rather communicative, and when asked to explain
what she meant by Mr. Hastings's peculiarities, replied "Oh, he's
queer every way--and no wonder, with his kind of a mother. Why she