Life to her had never been
joyous, though the trappings of life were so great in her eyes. But
it broke her heart that her child should die in the arms of another
old woman who had always been to her as an enemy. Lady Ushant, in
days now long gone by but still remembered as though they were
yesterday, had counselled the reception of the Canadian female. And
Lady Ushant, when the Canadian female and her husband were dead,
had been a mother to the boy whom she, Mrs. Morton, would so fain
have repudiated altogether. Lady Ushant had always been "on the
other side;" and now Lady Ushant was paramount at Bragton.
And doubtless there was some tenderness, though Mrs. Morton was
unwilling to own even to herself that she was moved by any such
feeling. If she had done her duty in counselling him to reject both
Reginald Morton and Arabella Trefoil,--as to which she admitted no
doubt in her own mind;--and if duty had required her to absent
herself when her counsel was spurned, then would she be weak and
unmindful of duty should she allow any softness of heart to lure
her back again. It was so she reasoned. But still some softness was
there; and when she heard that Miss Trefoil had gone, and that her
visit had not, in Mrs. Hopkins's opinion, "led to much," she wrote
to say that she would return. She made no request and clothed her
suggestion in no words of tenderness; but simply told her grandson
that she would come back--as the Trefoils had left him.
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