It was very pleasant up there, for a cheerful wood fire was blazing on
the hearth, and a rocking-chair drawn up before it, with a footstool
which Andy had made and Melinda covered, while the bed in the little
room adjoining looked so fresh, and clean, and inviting, that with a
great sigh of relief, as the door closed between her and the "dreadful
people below," Ethelyn threw herself upon it, and burying her face in
the soft pillows, tried to smother the sobs which, nevertheless, smote
heavily upon Richard's ear when he came in, and drove from him all
thoughts of the little lecture he had been intending to give Ethelyn
touching her deportment toward his folks. It would only be a fair
return, he reflected, for all the Caudles he had listened to so
patiently, and duly strengthened for his task by his mother's remark to
James, accidentally overheard, "Altogether too fine a lady for us. I
wonder what Richard was thinking of," he mounted the stairs resolved at
least to talk with Ethie and ask her to do better.
Richard could be very stern when he tried, and the hazel of his eye was
darker than usual, and the wrinkle between his eyebrows was deeper as he
thus meditated harm against his offending wife.
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