They had blossomed thickly about her path during this decade.  Her matronly beauty was the wonder and praise of the community.  The changing seasons that had bleached the locks upon her husband’s temples and heightened his forehead had spared the bronzed chestnut of her luxuriant tresses.  Her figure was larger and fuller, but graceful, and more queenly than of yore—­if that could be.  There was not an untuneful inflection in her voice, or a furrow between her brows.  Under her careful management the homestead wore every year an air of increased elegance.  No other furniture for many miles on both sides of the river could compare with hers; no other servants were so well-trained, no grounds so beautifully ornamented and trimly kept.

“But for all that Ridgeley is a lonely, desolate place to me,” said Mrs. Sutton, one early spring morning to her niece and crony, Mrs. William Sutton.  “A house without children is worse than a last year’s bird’s nest.  It is a riddle to me how Clara Aylett contrives to occupy her time.”

“She should have some of these socks to darn, if it hangs upon her hands,” replied Mrs. William, humorously, running her five fingers through the toe of one she had just picked up from the great willow basket set between the two upon the porch-floor.

“The Lord isn’t very apt to make mothers out of that sort of material,” said the elder lady.  “Nor fathers out of Winston Ayletts.  They are so wrapped up in their self-consequence as to have no thought for others.”

“Yet they say Mr. Aylett regrets that he has no heir.  It is a great pity Mabel lost her only child as she did.  The family will become extinct in another generation.  It is such a noble estate, too!”

“Large families were never the rule among the Ayletts,” responded Aunt Rachel.  “But I did hope my dear Mabel would be an exception to the rest in this respect.  She would adopt a little girl, but her husband will not consent.  Those Dorrances are a cold-hearted race.  He, too, is heaping up riches, without knowing who shall gather them.  Heigh-ho!”

Her darning-needle quilted the yawning heel of Tommy Sutton’s sock with precision and celerity, and she ruminated silently upon the vicissitudes and failures of mortal life until she was interrupted by Mrs. William’s exclamation: 

“There is Mrs. Tazewell’s carriage at the gate, and the driver has a letter in his hand.  I hope the old lady is not worse!”

Aunt Rachel met the man at the steps, with neighborly anxiety.

“How is your mistress, Jack?”

“’Bout the same, ma’am.  But Miss Rosa—­she came last night very unexpected, and it kinder worsted Mistis to see her so poorly.  This note is from Miss Rosa, ma’am, and I am to take back an answer.”

Mrs. Sutton read it standing in the porch—­the scented leaflet that had a look of the writer all over it, from the scarlet monogram at the top of the sheet and upon the envelope, to the flourish of the signature—­“Rosa T. C.”—­the curl of the C carried around the rest like a medallion frame: