What it cost her to cross that
threshold and walk in a stranger, to the house which had been all her
life as her own, she never said to any one. But it was independence; it
was deliverance from entreaties and remonstrances without end. It was a
kind of setting right, so far as could be, of the balance which had got
so terribly wrong. No writing to the earl now; no appeal to friends;
anything in all the world,--much more, honest service and kindness,--must
be better than that.
VIII.
"Tell the young lady all about it, Connie," said her mother.
But Connie was very reluctant to tell. She was very shy, and clung to her
mother, and hid her face in her ample dress; and though presently she was
beguiled by Mary's voice, and in a short time came to her side, and clung
to her as she had clung to Mrs. Turner, she still kept her secret to
herself. They were all very kind to Mary, the elder girls standing round
in a respectful circle looking at her, while their mother exhorted them
to "take a pattern" by Miss Vivian. The novelty, the awe which she
inspired, the real kindness about her, ended in overcoming in Mary's
young mind the first miserable impression of such a return to her home.
It gave her a kind of pleasure to write to Mrs. Bowyer that she had found
employment, and had thought it better to accept it at once.
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