It was a lovely day in early October when Bessie made her first visit to Grey's Park, of which she had heard such glowing descriptions from Jennie, who took her there in an invalid chair sent for the purpose by Miss Lucy.
The grass in the park was fresh and green from recent rains, and the late autumn flowers gave a brightness to the place scarcely equaled in summer.
"Oh, how lovely it is! pretty almost as the Kensington Gardens," Bessie exclaimed, as she entered the gate and looked around her. "I think I should like to live here," she continued; and then there came to her a thought of Grey, who would probably one day be master of the place, and she blushed guiltily, as if she had said some immodest thing.
Miss Lucy met her at the door, and, taking her to her room, made her lie down till they were joined, by Miss McPherson, who came to lunch, which was served in the breakfast-room, and was just the kind to tempt an invalid.
Bessie enjoyed it immensely, and felt herself growing stronger and better in the brightness and freshness of this beautiful home which was one day to be Grey's.
On the wall, beside Blind Robin's, there was a picture of Grey, taken in Europe when he was fourteen, and just before the great sorrow came upon him and robbed his face of a little of the assurance and boyish eagerness which the artist had depicted upon the canvas. But it was like him still--like him, as he was now, in his young manhood, when to do good to others, to make somebody happy every day, was the rule of his life. And Bessie's eyes were often fixed upon it, as, after lunch was over they still sat in the breakfast-room, because of the sunshine which came in so brightly at the windows. And while they sat there the elder women talked of Grey and what he would probably do, now that his travels in Europe were ended.
"He ought to marry and settle down. Is there any hope of his doing so?" Miss Betsey said, and Lucy replied: "I think so, yes, I am quite sure of it, if everything goes well, as I think it will."
Bessie was sitting with her back partly turned to the ladies, who did not see the crimson spots which covered her face for a moment and then left it deathly pale, as she heard that Grey Jerrold was to be married. For an instant everything around her turned black, and when she came to herself she felt that she could not breathe in that room with Grey's picture on the wall, and his eyes looking at her as they had looked that day, in Rome, when he had said to her words she would almost give half her life to hear again. Bessie was no dissembler. She could not sit there in her pain and make no sign, and, turning to her aunt, she said: "Please, auntie, let Jennie take me into the air, I am sick and faint; I--"