San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1890-11-07

are monStrOus inconvenience. don't
know many things so pleasant as get
ting rid of them. And as for going to
place where nobody knows you've
gone to fifty places where nobody knew
me, and b, IN quite friendless in them,
and perfectly comfortable. Why
shouldn't Mrs. Hill do the same? She
has something of my taste, suppose.
1t seems quite a rational taste to me-"
"Oh, but, Guy my dear, the cases are
wholly different" Aunt Susan be-
gaa to explain in an earnest tone. But
her brother merely laughed and made
his way toward the door.
Have you told Wilson about taking
the carriage?" he interrupted her to ask.
Don't trouble yourself about it if you
haven't: I'll tell him, he said. And
then Aunt Susan was left to carry on
her puzzled speculations alone.
Speculate over the widow as she might,
however, Miss DunStan had as cordial
a welcome for her when she came as
any of the rest. She went out into the
hall in the dim November afternoon
when she heard the sound of the car
riage wheels. and was the first to greet
Mrs. Hill and kiss her.
Il am glad to have you, my dear.
How could you hesitate about coming?"
she said to her; and she took her up
stairs, holding her hand and patting it,
and saying dozen kind things to her
by the way.
81 thought that nothing would ever
induce me to do this,-and yet am do
ing it. Do you think l am right to
Gomez" Esther said, with curious
pathos and earnestneSs in her voice,
standing still for moment in the room
70. x.,hi
the others faces for Gabrielle had come
up with her tool before she took her
bonnet off.
Right? How could it be anything
but right?" Gabrielle exclaimed impui-
sively,-''if you are willing to come,
and if we want you,-as we do" she
said.
do you really want me?" the woman
asked wistfully; and then, at this ques-
ton, and at the look in her face, if
there had been touch of GOODNESS left
in any corner of Aunt Susan's heart, it
vanished, merged itself suddenly in
the general kindness and warmth, and
with little outburst of tenderness
MY dear, we dove do, every one
of u.s." she said.
And indeed am sureI have said no
more than the TRUTH" she exclaimed to
herself with some little uneasinesS
presently. when she had closed the
widows door, and was returning down
stairs again; ''for though do wish we
knew little more about her, yet l am
sure every one in the house-even Guy
likes to have her here, and as for me,
| am such an old goose that when she
stands and looks at me as she did just
now | think she could make me say and
do whatever she liked. Not that did
say anything, | am sure, that was not
perfectly true" repeated Aunt Susan
anxiously, trying to satisfy her con-
science, which was troubled still with
slight uneasy twinge.
A very silent evening was this first
evening that Esther spent at Wrexham,
for, dear as the household had become
to her, it was so strange to her to find
herself thrown into the midst of their
familiar home life that she could not at
first be happy or at ease in it. Moe
than once as the hours went on she said
to herself.
II wish 1 had not come. am so out
of place here-I am only an encum-
brance to them all-why did Icomep"
And yet to the bottom Of her heart
she felt how good they were to her: she
had looked forward to no kindness or
cOrdiality from them that they did not
give her; she knew the fault was only
in herself. 1t was she who was cold,
not they: it was she who. was shy and
i'll at ease, not they who failed in any
thing that gentleness or sweetness could
do.
She shrank into a quiet place by
Helen's side, and stayed there nearly all
the evening. In the shadow of Helen's
invalid chair there seemed to be a sort
of shelter and protection for her. She
sat there, sometimes reading, some
times working, sOmetimes-when they
made her talk-talking little, but
voluntarily joining in hardly anything
that was going on. 1t was the first
evening that she had ever passed with
them, and, accustomed to her solitude
as she had become, and to the sadness
of her own thoughts, she became OPP
pressed by a morbid sense of being
where she ought not to be-of being
drag upon the rest.
Amongst themselves this Wrexham
household was social: the women were
takers; the master of the house was no
recluse; he liked to sit in the midst of
the feminine voices, reading his book or
his newspaper when he chose in the
midst of them, undisturbed by their
chattering, and when he chose laying
down book or paper to talk to them
himself and be talked to. He had a
study to which he was expected to re-
tire when he wanted solitude, but he by
no means always spent much of his even
ings there. If he got tired of the femi-
nine clatter in the drawing-room, he
would more often choose to silence it
nv baUinninp tn read alOud than tO
escape from it by betaking himself to