"Yes, yes; let us go in-doors; then you can lie down quietly, or sit in an easy-chair, while I do my little errand more ceremoniously, for to speak the truth you look very pale yet. Take my arm; indeed you can hardly walk."
Barbara only bowed; she could not force herself to touch the lady's arm, but, with a will that was like strength, walked into the house. Lady Phipps followed her, lifting the skirt of her dress daintily from the grass, and smiling with a sort of puzzled air, as if she did not quite understand the scene she was acting in.
Barbara entered her own room, which was the best apartment in the house, and according to the usages of the time, furnished with a high bed, covered with a blue and white yarn coverlet, and pillows like little snow-drifts. A bureau of cherry-tree wood, with two or three stiff wooden chairs, an oaken arm-chair with a broad, splint bottom, stood by the window, with its curtain of sweetbrier and morning-glory vines. This, Barbara offered to her visitor. But Lady Phipps, with that genial grace which made every action of hers like a sunbeam, wheeled the chair around, and motioned that Barbara should occupy it. Then she seated herself on the bed, burying one elbow in the snow of the pillow, and drooping her round cheek into the palm of her hand.
"Now," she said, with a charming smile, "that we are both comfortable, let me give my invitation in proper form. First, young Lovel, who is my husband's secretary, you know, or are now informed, has set the whole gubernatorial mansion wild about you. He will have it—but no matter about his young fancies—he of course is very anxious that you should not suffer inconvenience, or remain a stranger in the New World, where Englishmen and Englishwomen should meet as brothers and sisters. He could not come himself."
"I trust—I hope—that the young gentleman has suffered no injury?" said Barbara, half starting from the chair; while for the first time Lady Phipps saw the color rush to her face. "I should be grieved."
"No harm in the world," said Lady Phipps, laughingly interrupting her; "but to tell you the truth, he was so pleasantly employed, that I had no heart to bring him away."
Barbara looked up with a questioning glance; a grave smile stole over her lips, and she said very quietly—
"Indeed! You must all have been very anxious about him."
"Anxious! You never saw such a night! None of us thought of rest. The governor, whose self-control is the admiration of everybody, wandered about the town all night long, while I and poor little Elizabeth Parris—the pretty young creature I hinted at, you know—really fretted ourselves almost into hysterics. Let me assure you, upon my honor, I almost knew how people feel when they are unhappy."
"Almost!" murmured Barbara Stafford, lifting her eyes with a gleam of mournful astonishment. But Lady Phipps was full of her subject, and went on.
"So, after we had welcomed Norman back again, and petted him into believing himself of the greatest possible consequence, I came off here to beg that you will leave this lonesome old place, and honor Sir William's roof, while it shall suit your convenience."
"But I am a stranger—even a nameless one."
"I beg your pardon—not altogether. Sir William has, as you know, lived a good deal in England, and the Staffords, of Lincolnshire, are among his most powerful friends."
"The Staffords, of Lincolnshire?"
"Oh, I forget, you have no idea how we found out the name. It was on the handkerchief you lost in the sand. 'Barbara Stafford,' a fine old name that my husband loves well."
A faint smile stole over the strange lady's face, but she only bent her head in acknowledgment of Lady Phipps's kindness.
"Your name alone is sufficient introduction, but Sir William is curious to know to what branch of the family it belongs—the earl?"
"I am in no way connected with the Earl of Stafford," said Barbara, quickly; "in fact, have no claim upon the hospitality of your—of Sir William Phipps. My object in coming to America is perhaps already accomplished. With many thanks for this kindness, I must, for the present at least, decline your invitation."
Lady Phipps looked a little disappointed. She was so accustomed to having her own way, and seeing her very caprices regarded as a law, that this refusal of the stranger to become her guest brought the color to her brow.
"The governor will be greatly disappointed," she said, displacing her elbow from the pillow with a movement of graceful impatience. "I really shan't know what to say. Norman, too, will be quite beside himself. They will think me a miserable ambassadress—in fact, if any thing makes me ill-natured and awkward, it is a refusal."
Barbara almost smiled. Notwithstanding her summertime of life, there was something very attracting in Lady Phipps's sparkling manner, which, beneath the frank playfulness of a child, betrayed all the dignity of a proud woman.
"It is not a refusal," said Barbara, gently; "perhaps only a delay; but just now I am too—too weary for society, and need time for rest."
"Then we shall yet have the pleasure?" exclaimed Lady Phipps, brightening, and holding out her hand; but she became grave in an instant, for the palm that met hers was cold as snow.
"You are, indeed, quite unfit for exertion," she said.
Barbara drew the cold hand from Lady Phipps's clasp, and, standing up, looked at her with a strained gaze as she left the room. The moment she was quite alone, wrapped up in the stillness of an empty house, the pale woman walked forward to the bed, fell upon it without a breath or a sob, and lay motionless with her face to the pillow.
That night, after all the family were asleep, except Goody Brown, she was surprised by the rustle of a silk dress at her elbow, just as she was raking up the kitchen fire for the night. She turned quickly, and saw her guest, who stood shivering on the hearth as if it had been the depth of winter.
"Goodness me!" exclaimed the housewife, planting her iron shovel with a plunge into the ashes; "I thought you'd gone to bed long ago. Any thing the matter?"
"Nothing—nothing!" answered the lady, sinking into one of the straight-backed chairs that stood near the hearth; "I heard you stirring, and so came out. Sit down a little while; I would like to ask a few questions about this new country—about Boston and its people."
Goody Brown seated herself on the dye-tub, which occupied a corner of the chimney, and smoothing down her checked apron prepared to listen. She was no great talker at any time, and though the questions asked by her guest were low-toned, and uttered at long intervals, she heard them patiently and answered each in its place, without betraying any of that curiosity said to be characteristic of the New England matron of later days.
During the whole conversation, Barbara sat back in her chair, quite still, gazing upon the half-smothered embers with a dull, heavy look. The tallow candle, with its long tow wick, that occupied a little round stand in a corner, left her face in the shadow, and the good woman remained quite unconscious how pale it was till her guest arose to say good-night; then she remembered how husky her voice had been, and how she seemed to shiver with cold.
"Do let me rake open the embers and give you a bowl of yarb tea, and put another coverlet on the bed," she urged, in her stiff, motherly way; "the teeth e'en a'most chatter in your head; you'll sartinly be took down agin."
"No, no! I shall be quieter now that I know—that I know all about the country, thank you."
And with a soft, gliding step, noiseless as when she entered, Barbara went into her room again.
"That's strange," muttered Goody Brown, as she sat before the buried fire with a foot planted on each andiron, meditating on the conversation she had just held. "Now can she be any relative to the governor or his wife, or the Salem minister, I wonder? She's mighty curious about them. Well, thank goodness, I'd as lief tell her all I know about 'em as not. There ain't no witchcraft in the truth."
CHAPTER VIII.