"
"Of Great-aunt Emmeline, you mean, sir," replied Virginia, laughing.
"Oh, yes, my child," chuckled the Major. "Let him learn the value of
Great-aunt Emmeline, by all means."
When the old gentleman had gone, Betty went into the garden, where the
grass was powdered with small spring flowers, and gathered a bunch of white
violets for her mother. Aunt Lydia was walking slowly up and down in the
mild sunshine, and her long black shadow passed over the girl as she knelt
in the narrow grass-grown path. A slender spray of syringa drooped down
upon her head, and the warm wind was sweet with the heavy perfume of the
lilacs. On the whitewashed fence a catbird was calling over the meadow, and
another answered from the little bricked-up graveyard, where the gate was
opened only when a fresh grave was to be hollowed out amid the periwinkle.
As Betty knelt there, something in the warm wind, the heavy perfume, or the
old lady's flitting shadow touched her with a sudden melancholy, and while
the tears lay upon her lashes, she started quickly to her feet and looked
about her. But a great peace was in the air, and around her she saw only
the garden wrapped in sunshine, the small spring flowers in bloom, and Aunt
Lydia moving up and down in the box-bordered walk.
VI
THE MEETING IN THE TURNPIKE
On a late September afternoon Dan rode leisurely homeward along the
turnpike. He had reached New York some days before, but instead of hurrying
on with Champe, he had sent a careless apology to his expectant
grandparents while he waited over to look up a missing trunk.
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