--and in these she
dressed me. And then we fell into each others arms, and I wept upon her
neck the first tears I had shed that day. As I stood on the doorstep,
she held up the candle and looked at me.
"My dear!" she said, "how pretty your sweet face does look out of those
great furs! You shall keep them always."
Dear Harriet! Her one idea--beauty. I suppose the "ruling passion,"
whatever it may be, is strong with all of us, even in the face of death.
Moreover, hers was one of those shallow minds that seem instinctively to
escape by any avenue from a painful subject; and by the time that I was
in the chariot, she had got over the first shock, and there was an
almost infectious cheerfulness in her farewell.
"It _must_ be all right, Dolly!"
Then I fell back, and we started. The warm light of the open door became
a speck, and then nothing; and in the long dark drive, when every
footfall of the horses seemed to consume an age, the sickening agony of
suspense was almost intolerable. Oh, my dear! never, never shall I
forget that night. The black trees and hedges whirling past us in the
darkness, always the same, like an enchanted drive; then the endless
suburbs, and at last the streets where people lounged in corners and
stopped the way, as if every second of time were not worth a king's
ransom; and sedan-chairs trotted lightly home from gay parties as if
life were not one long tragedy.
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