Page:The Father Confessor, Stories of Danger and Death.djvu/271

Rh among the group by the fire, all eyes were turned upon them curiously. Lucy was soon passed over. Small, fair, the ordinary type of a pretty American woman, she attracted no particular notice. But Virginia! For the first time her friends were startled. They were bound to admit Mrs. Donald had some foundation for her story. The beautiful eyes were too black, the nose a trifle broad; the lips over full; the hair—yes, there was no passing over the hair—it was the hair of a black woman, short, fine, curly, black as night, though it set about a face as white as any round the fire.

Miss Anderson shaded her eyes from the fire and looked straight at Virginia.

"We were talking about blacks," she said. "Isn't there a great prejudice against the negroes in America?"

Virginia turned towards her a bright face.

"Well, yes," she admitted, "I suppose you people over here think so; but they are a low type of humanity, they will never have intelligence enough to be anything but the slaves or servants of the white races."

Lucy turned upon her sister rather fiercely.

"You are unfair," she said; "give them