“Simply because she wasn’t invited, I suppose,” returned his wife, detecting the disappointment in his face.

“Not invited!” he repeated; “I didn’t know as this trip was of sufficient consequence to need a special invitation.  I thought, of course, she was here——­”

“Or you would have gone on horseback,” said his wife, ever ready to catch at straws.

Mr. Graham saw the rising jealousy in time to repress the truthful:  answer—­“Yes”—­while he compromised the matter by saying that “the presence of three fair ladies ought to satisfy him.”

Carrie was too much disappointed even to smile, and during all the ride she was extremely taciturn, hardly replying at all to Mr. Graham’s lively sallies, and winning golden laurels in the opinion of Mrs. Graham, who secretly thought her husband altogether too agreeable.  As they turned into the long avenue which led to Woodlawn, and Carrie thought of the ride which ’Lena had enjoyed alone with its owner—­for such was Durward reported to be—­her heart swelled with bitterness toward her cousin, in whom she saw a dreaded rival.  But when they reached the house, and Durward assisted her to alight, keeping at her side while they walked over the grounds, her jealousy vanished, and with her sweetest smile she looked up into his face, affecting a world of childish simplicity, and making, as she believed, a very favorable impression.

“I wonder if you are as much pleased with Woodlawn as your cousin,” said Durward, noticing that her mind seemed to be more intent on foreign subjects than the scenery around her.

“Oh, no, I dare say not,” returned Carrie. “’Lena was never accustomed to anything until she came to Kentucky, and now I suppose she thinks she must go into ecstacies over everything, though I sometimes wish she wouldn’t betray her ignorance quite so often.”

“According to her description, her home in Massachusetts was widely different from her present one,” said Durward, and Carrie quickly replied, “I wonder now if she bored you with an account of her former home!  You must have been edified, and had a delightful ride, I declare.”

“And I assure you I never had a pleasanter one, for Miss Rivers is, I think, an exceedingly agreeable companion,” returned Durward, beginning to see the drift of her remarks.

Here Mr. Graham called to his son, and excusing himself from Carrie, he did not again return to her until it was time to go home.  Meantime, at Maple Grove, Mrs. Livingstone, in the worst possible humor, was finding fault with poor ’Lena, accusing her of eavesdropping, and asking her if she did not begin to believe the old adage, that listeners never heard any good of themselves.  In perfect astonishment ’Lena demanded what she meant, saying she had never, to her knowledge, been guilty of listening.

Without any explanation, whatever, Mrs. Livingstone declared herself “satisfied now, for a person who would listen and then deny it, was capable of almost anything.”