Her opposition made him believe in his love for Rose, but shortly the beauty and the charm of Grace, the second daughter, about sixteen, dissipated that belief, although he had pledged himself with word and ring to Rose.

Grace, mortified by the rivalry between her mother and sister, and conscious of a growing passion for the man who had, unintentionally, crept into the lives of three women in one household bound by the closest ties of blood, fled the place, and went down the broad river to a little town, where she found quiet and friendly shelter in the home of a relative.  It was a curious place, very old, and in the heart of evergreens.  There was a young girl, Lydia, who was much older, had loved, and knew that priceless art of bringing comfort to those who were loving either wisely or too well.  Letters, books, and gifts came from Basil bearing one burden—­his love for Grace.  The mother, more jealous of Rose than of Grace, consented to his marriage with either, and fell into a state of despondency which made quick and mysterious inroads upon her hitherto excellent health.

When Grace, being called home by the alarming state of her mother’s health, parted with Lydia, she said: 

“My duty is clear; I can not be the rival of my mother and Rose.  I love him, but I must give him up.”  And so she did, although the engagement between Rose and Basil was broken and never renewed.

Rumor said cruel things about Basil:  that he had wasted their beautiful estate and enriched himself out of their many possessions.  Anyhow, they left their mansion on the hill-top, and it was sold to an institution of learning, and the grounds were divided and subdivided into lots.  The mother never recovered.  After an illness of several years she died suddenly at some winter resort, with the old name of Basil on her lips that formed the word and then were forever still.  Rose and Grace could look upon those familiar features and behold the trace of beauty which time and disease had tenderly spared.  But Mary, the third daughter, blind from her birth, could only feel the face of her beloved and kiss the lips that could no longer speak her name.  Blind! and without a mother, even if she had been foolish for her years, and had, in an hour of human weakness, yielded to a love which was useless, out of the question, unnatural.  She was twelve, yet the little blind maid was old enough to know her loss, to feel her sorrow.

Rose, cold, selfish, unsympathetic, lamenting the loss of a lover whom she had no power to hold more than the death of her mother, feeling no love for the sister who had made for her sake a useless sacrifice, was not a desirable companion for the little blind sister.

Grace, upon whom the care of the child had fallen these latter years, and who had been faithful and loving to her charge, had begun to put worldly things from her, and when that long-expected but sudden death came upon them, she resolved, after much meditation and prayer, to enter some holy order and lead a life dedicated to the Master.