"I have a
surprise for you, darling. Can you bear it now?"
Oh, how eagerly poor Maggie Miller looked up in Rose's face! The car
whistle had sounded half an hour before. Could it be that he had come?
Was he there? Did he love her still? No, Maggie, no; the surprise
awaiting you is of a far different nature, and the tears flow afresh
when Rose, in reply to the question "What is it, darling?" answers,
"It is this," at the same time placing in Maggie's hand an ambrotype
which she bade her examine. With a feeling of keen disappointment
Maggie opened the casing, involuntarily shutting her eyes as if to
gather strength for what she was to see.
It was a young face--a handsome face--a face much like her own, while
in the curve of the upper lip and the expression of the large black
eyes there was a look like Hagar Warren. They had met together thus,
the one a living reality, the other a semblance of the dead, and she
who held that picture trembled violently. There was a fierce struggle
within, the wildly beating heart throbbing for one moment with a
newborn love, and then rebelling against taking that shadow, beautiful
though it was, in place of her whose memory she had so long revered.
"Who is it, Maggie?" Rose asked, leaning over her shoulder.
Maggie knew full well whose face it was she looked upon, but not yet
could she speak that name so interwoven with memories of another, and
she answered mournfully, "It is Hester Hamilton.
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