Laudersdale, rising earnestly, like one in an eager
dream.
"It is plain that you are in training for a poet," said Helen Heath,
laughing, to Mr. Raleigh. "Well, when will you take us? Are the lilies
in bloom? Shall we go to-morrow morning?"
"I don't know that I shall take you at all, Miss Helen;--river-lilies
might suit you best; but these queens of the lakes, the great, calm
pond-lilies, creatures of quiet and white radiance,--I have seen only
one head that possessed enough of the genuine East-Indian repose to be
crowned with them."
"You like repose," said Mrs. Laudersdale. "But what is it?"
"Repose is strength,--life that develops from within, and feels itself
and has no need of effort. Repose is inherent security."
"Goodness!" exclaimed Helen. "Article first in a new
dictionary,--encyclopedia, I should say. You worship, but you don't
possess your god, for you look at this moment like a shaft in the bow;
and here comes an archer to give it flight."
"Where are you going, Kate?" said her cousin.
"To pick strawberries in the garden. Want to come?"
The three could do no better than accept her invitation. The good ladies
might stare as they could after Mrs. Laudersdale, and wonder what
sudden sprite had possessed her, since for neither man nor woman of the
numerous party had she hitherto condescended to lift an unwonted eyelid;
what they would have said to have seen her plunged in a strawberry-bed,
gathering handfuls and raining them drop by drop into Helen Heath's
mouth, to silence her while she herself might talk,--her own fingers
tipped with more sanguine shade than their native rose, her eyes full
of the noon sparkle, and her lips parted with laughter,--we cannot say.
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