Such an era was like to be rather memorable. The girls thought so, somewhat solemnly, as they went to their work beside their mother. They seemed to be coming to graver times themselves, gliding on in an irresistible noiseless fashion upon their stream of fate.
Louis came again as usual in the evening. He _had_ heard Mrs Edgerley, and did resent her careless freedom, as Marian secretly knew he would; which fact she who was most concerned, ascertained by his entire and pointed silence upon the subject, and his vehement and passionate contempt, notwithstanding, for Mrs Edgerley.
“I suppose you are safe enough,” he said, speaking to the elder sister. “You will not break your heart because she has forgotten the name of your book--but, heaven help them, there are hearts which do! There are unfortunate fools in this crazy world mad enough to be elated and to be thrown into misery by a butterfly of a fine lady, who makes reputations. You think them quite contemptible, do you? but there are such.”
“I suppose they must be people who have no friends and no home--or to whom it is of more importance than it is to me,” said Agnes; “for I am only a woman, and nothing could make me miserable out of this Old Lodge, or Bellevue.”
“Ah--that is _now_,” said Louis quickly, and he glanced with an instinctive reference at Marian, whose pallid roses and fluctuating mood already began to testify to some anxiety out of the boundary of these charmed walls. “The very sight of your security might possibly be hard enough upon us who have no home--no home! nothing at all under heaven.”
“Except such trifles as strength and youth and a stout heart, a sister very fond of you, and some--some _friends_--and heaven itself, after all, at the end. Oh, Louis!” said Agnes, who on this, as on other occasions, was much disposed to be this “boy’s” elder sister, and advised him “for his good.”
He did not say anything. When he looked up at all from his bending attitude leaning over the table, it was to glance with fiery devouring eyes at Marian--poor little sweet Marian, already pale with anxiety for him. Then he broke out suddenly--“That poor little sister who is very fond of me--do you know what she is doing at this moment--singing to them!--like the captives at Babylon, making mirth for the spoilers. And my friends---- heaven! you heard what that woman ventured to say to-day.”