"She's paying for her mock composure, after all," said the matrons.
"It must have been a great effort."
III.
Ten years afterwards, Mrs. Lawrie went on board a steamer at
Southampton, bound for New York. She was travelling alone, having
been called suddenly from Europe by the approaching death of her
aged father. For two or three days after sailing, the thick, rainy
spring weather kept all below, except a few hardy gentlemen who
crowded together on the lee of the smoke-stack, and kept up a
stubborn cheerfulness on a very small capital of comfort. There
were few cabin-passengers on board, but the usual crowd of
emigrants in the steerage.
Mrs. Lawrie's face had grown calmer and colder during these years.
There was yet no gray in her hair, no wrinkles about her clear
eyes; each feature appeared to be the same, but the pale,
monotonous color which had replaced the warm bloom of her youth,
gave them a different character. The gracious dignity of her
manner, the mellow tones of her voice, still expressed her
unchanging goodness, yet those who met her were sure to feel, in
some inexplicable way, that to be good is not always to be happy.
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