Always conciliatory, however, she soon remarked: "You are sole male heir to the Richards name. Mother's heart and pride
are bound up in you. A poor, unknown girl would only add to our
expenses, and not help you in the least. What was her name? I've never
heard."
John hesitated, then answered: "I called her Lily, she was so fair and
pure."
Anna was never in the least suspicious, but took all things for granted,
so now she thought within herself, "Lilian, most likely." Then she said:
"You were not engaged to her, were you?"
John started forward, and gazed into his sister's face with an
expression as if he wished she would question him more closely, but Anna
never dreamed of a secret, and seeing him hesitate, she said: "You need not tell me unless you like. I only thought, maybe, you and
Lily were not engaged."
"We were. Anna, I'm a wretch--a miserable wretch, and have scarcely
known an hour's peace since I left her."
"Was there a scene?" Anna asked; and John replied: "Worse than that. Worse for her. She did not know I was going till I was
gone. I wrote to her from Paris, for I could not meet her face and tell
her how mean I was. I've thought of her so much, and when I landed in
New York I went at once to find her, or at least to inquire, hoping
she'd forgotten me. The beldame who kept the place was not the same with
whom I had left Lily, but she know about her, and told me she died with
cholera last September. She and--oh, Lily, Lily--" and hiding his face
in Anna's lap, John Richards, whom we have only seen as a traveled
dandy, sobbed like a little child.
"John," she said at last, when the sobbing had ceased, "You say this
Lily was good. Do you mean she was a Christian, like Charlie?"
"Yes, if there ever was one. Why, she used to make a villain like me
kneel with her every night, and say the Lord's Prayer."
For an instant, a puzzling thought crossed Anna's brain as to the
circumstances which could have brought her brother every night to Lily's
side, but it passed away immediately as she rejoined: "Then she is safe in heaven, and there are no tears there. We'll try to
meet her some day. You could not help her dying. She might have died had
she been your wife, so I'd try to think it happened for the best, and
you'll soon get to believing it did. That's my experience. You are young
yet, and life has much in store for you. You'll find some one to fill
Lily's place; some one whom we shall all think worthy of you, and
we'll be so happy together."