her girlhood friends
kept aloof. If their defection pained her, she gave no sign--she had
something of her father's pride. Among the Republican gentry she was of
course made much of, and she saw something of the plainer sort of her
husband's friends. Tom Mocket came occasionally on business with Rand,
and once he brought Vinie with him. Jacqueline liked the sandy-haired
and freckled scamp, and made friends with Vinie. In the first July days
Adam Gaudylock often sat upon her porch, but now for weeks he had been
wandering in the West. Once or twice Mr. Pincornet, straying that way,
had delicately looked his pity for a lovely woman in a desert waste.
Cousin Jane Selden remained her good neighbour and kind friend, and once
Mr. Ned Hunter brought a message from Unity. Her old minister came to
see her, and Dr. Gilmer, when illness called him in that direction,
always drew rein at her gate. Ludwell Cary was out of the county, and
Fairfax Cary never rode that way. Unity came whenever it was possible,
and thrice, between July and October, Deb and Miranda and a horsehair
trunk arrived for a blissful week. To Deb they were unshadowed days. The
log house, the pine wood and singing stream, an owl that hooted each
night, a row of tiger lilies and a thicket of blackberries, Jacqueline
to tell her stories, Mammy Chloe and Hannah, the new brother who came
home every evening riding a great bay horse and kissing Jacqueline
beneath the mimosa tree, the brother who showed her twenty unguessed
treasures and gave her the Arabian Nights,--Deb thought the week on the
Three-Notched Road a piece out of the book, and wept when she must go
back to Fontenoy.

But Colonel Churchill and Major Edward never came, never wrote, never
sent messages to Jacqueline, never, she forced Unity to tell her,
mentioned her name or would hear it mentioned at Fontenoy. Only Aunt
Nancy, lying always in the chamber, her key-basket beside her on the
white counterpane, talked of her when she chose. "But she talks as
though you were dead," acknowledged Unity; then, "Oh, Jacqueline, it
must all come right some day! And as for him, he's talked of more and
more,--everywhere one goes, one hears his name! He's head and front of
his party here. Oh, what a party! Mrs. Adams writes that at Washington
they eat soup with their fingers and still think _Ca Ira_ the latest
song! Cannot you convert him? They say the Mammoth's jealous, and that
your husband and Colonel Burr correspond in