She would have done so much better, and looked so much neater,
especially her shoes! Andy could not quite forgive Melinda's big feet
and ankles, especially as his contempt for such appendages was
constantly kept in mind by the sight of the little half-worn slippers
which Ethie had left in her closet when she moved to Camden, and which,
now that she was gone, he kept as something almost as sacred as Daisy's
hair, admiring the dainty rosettes and small high heels more than he
admired the whole of Melinda's wardrobe when spread upon the bed, and
tables, and chairs, preparatory to packing it for Des Moines. Richard,
too, remembered Ethelyn, and never did Melinda stand at his side in any
gay saloon that he did not see in her place a brown-eyed, brown-haired
woman who would have moved a very queen among the people. Ethelyn was
never forgotten, whether in the capitol, or the street, or at home, or
awake, or asleep. Ethie's face and Ethie's form were everywhere, and if
earnest, longing thoughts could have availed to bring her back, she
would have come, whether across the rolling sea, or afar from the
trackless desert. But they could not reach her, Ethie did not come, and
the term of Richard's governorship glided away, and he declined a
re-election, and went back to Olney, looking ten years older than when
he left it, with an habitual expression of sadness on his face, which
even strangers noticed, wondering what was the heart trouble which was
aging him so fast, and turning his brown hair gray.
For a time the stillness and quiet of Olney were very acceptable to him,
and then he began to long for more excitement--something to divert his
mind from the harrowing fear, daily growing more and more certain, that
Ethie would never come back. It was four years since she went away, and
nothing had been heard from her since the letter sent to Andy from New
York. "Dead," he said to himself many a time, and but for the dread of
the hereafter, he, too, would gladly have lain down in the graveyard
where Daisy was sleeping so quietly. With Andy it was different. Ethie
was not dead--he knew she was not--and some time she would surely come
back, There was comfort in Andy's strong assurance, and Richard always
felt better after a talk with his hopeful brother. Perhaps she would
come back, and if so he must have a place worthy of her, he said, one
day, to Melinda, who seized the opportunity to unfold a plan she had
long been cogitating. During the two years spent in Des Moines, James
had devoted himself to the study of law, preferring it to his farming,
and now he was looking out for a good locality where to settle and
practice his profession.