Page:The Galaxy, Volume 5.djvu/81

Rh of the day to have given her mistress something else to think about. As it was, following her, and beholding the look of complete gratification with which Elisabetta was regarding the crisply-roasted ducks, she forgave the want of worry concerning the storm, and returned to her pristine good nature. "Shure they looks like the angels in heaven," she said. "They're that beautiful with the brown breasts of them. An' whin the young master sets his fork intil the juicy sides forninst ye—d'ye be after minding, m'am, that its in that same spot there he'll be putting the fork of him? Dade, I'm as big a fool as herself!" she added, under her voice and her apron.

But though Nora's tears spurted through her fingers at sight of all the preparation for the feast, Elisabetta surveyed everything with the same calmness as if Sebastian came home every day to dinner; the crimson and white mosaic of the tarts, the vast pudding, into which such strata of citron and plums had been stirred that each raisin stood up like a separate nightmare, the crystal-clear apple juice that filled the plate round the turnover that had the word "Sebastian" pricked upon its cover, the luscious whips, and all manner of toothsome nicknacks; the whole array flanked with such jars of sweetmeat, strawberry, quinces, and damson, such store of chutney, curry, and all Indian sauces, such white bread, and such black cake, that the house seemed garrisoned against starvation, but given over to indigestion, for a month. Then Elisabetta brushed her hand across the window-pane, and was sorry, as she saw the thick air, that Maggie Shagreugh could not come for her chicken to-day, nor Katy for her mince pie, and then she went up stairs to see, as if she had not seen a hundred times before, if Sebastian's room was all as it should be. Nor was anything wanting there; the best chamber had been appointed, the bed, the curtains, the toilet covers, were white as the storm without; Nora must light the fire now, that the chill might utterly disappear. The drawerful of woollen socks, which she had knit for him was right, but she sorted them anew; she changed the towels just for the sake of changing them; then she went and filled the vases with flowers from the stand in the sitting-room window that were accustomed to drink the sun from morning to night, blood-red calceolarias, snowy chrysanthemums, golden hyacinths, some violets, a rose—the room was sweeter than a garden—and then she sat down and enjoyed it for a while. By that, it was dinner time for Elisabetta, and after dinner, a sleep and a dream before the fire.

It was close on the swift-footed twilight when Elisabetta woke. Her first step was to the window, arid still the tempest was tearing on. She shivered in a little draught, but would not say, even to herself, that there had been no such storm along these shores in all the years that she could recollect. You could not see a rod before