Family Pride

Aunt Betsy did not rest well after her return from the opera. Novelty and excitement always kept her awake, while her mind was not wholly at ease with regard to what she had done. Not that she really felt she had committed a sin, except so far as the example might be bad, but she feared the result, should it ever reach the orthodox church at Silverton.

"There's no telling what Deacon Bannister would do--send a subpoena after me, for what I know," she thought, as she laid her tired head upon her pillow and went off into that weary state halfway between sleep and wakefulness, a state in which operas, play actors, Katy in full dress, Helen and Mark Ray, choruses, music by the orchestra, to which she had been guilty of beating her foot, Deacon Bannister and the whole offended brotherhood, with constable and subpoenas, were pretty equally blended together--the music which she liked, and the subpoena which she feared taking the precedence of the others.

But with the daylight her fears subsided, and at the breakfast table she was hardly less enthusiastic over the opera than Mattie herself, averring, however; that "once would do her and she had no wish to go again."

The sight of Katy looking so frail and delicate, but so beautiful withal, had awakened all the olden intense love she had felt for her darling, and she could not wait much longer without seeing her "in her own home and hearing her blessed voice."

"Hannah, and Lucy amongst 'em, advised me not to come," she said to Mrs. Tubbs, "hinting that I might not be wanted up there; but now I'm here I shall go if I don't stay more than an hour."

"Of course I should," Mattie answered, herself anxious to stand beneath Wilford Cameron's roof and see Mrs. Wilford at home. "She don't look as proud as Helen, and you are her aunt, her blood kin, so why shouldn't you go there if you like?"

"I shall--I am going," Aunt Betsy replied, feeling that to take Mattie with her was not quite the thing, and not exactly knowing how to manage, for the girl must of course pilot the way. "I'll risk it and trust to Providence," was her final decision, and so after an early lunch she started out with Mattie as her escort, suggesting that they visit Wilford's office first and get that affair out of her mind.

At this point Aunt Betsy began to look upon herself as a most hardened wretch, wondering at the depths of iniquity to which she had fallen. The opera was the least of her offenses, for she was not harboring pride and contriving how to be rid of 'Tilda Tubbs, as clever a girl as ever lived, hoping that if she found Wilford he would see her home, and so save 'Tilda the trouble? Playhouses, pride, vanity, subterfuge and deceit--it was a long catalogue she would have to confess to Deacon Bannister, if confess she did, and with a groan the conscience-smitten woman followed her conductor along the street, and at last into the stage which took them to Wilford's office.