he
had given him the place in her heart which should have belonged to her
own niece. When she thought of the other trial, she believed herself,
still, more sinned against than sinning, and gave herself frequent
assurances that it had been impossible to act otherwise at the time of
her brother's death and his wife's strange behavior afterward. And she
had persuaded her conscience to be quiet, until at last, with the
ideal of a suspicious, uncongenial, disagreeable group of rustics in
her mind, she thought it was well ordered by Heaven that she had been
spared any closer intercourse.

Miss Prince was a proud and stately woman of the old New England type:
more colonial than American perhaps, and quite provincial in her
traditions and prejudices. She was highly respected in her native
town, where she was a prominent figure in society. Nobody was more
generous and kind or public spirited, as her friends often said, and
young George Gerry was well-rewarded, though he gave her great
pleasure by his evident affection and interest. He liked to pay
frequent visits to his old friend, and to talk with her. She had been
a very attractive girl long ago, and the best of her charms had not
faded yet; the young man was always welcomed warmly, and had more than
once been helped in his projects. His mother was a feeble woman, who
took little interest in anything outside her own doors; and he liked
himself better as he sat in Miss Prince's parlor than anywhere else.
We are always fond of the society of our best selves, and though he
was popular with the rest of his townspeople, he somehow could not
help trying always to be especially agreeable to Miss Prince.

Although she was apparently free from regrets, and very well satisfied
with life, even her best friends did not know how lonely her life had
seemed to her, or how sadly hurt she had been by the shame and sorrow
of her only brother's marriage. The thought of his child and of the
impossibility of taking her to her heart and home had been like a
nightmare at first, and yet Miss Prince lacked courage to break down
the barriers, and to at least know the worst. She kept the two ideas
of the actual niece and the ideal one whom she might have loved so
much distinct and separate in her mind, and was divided between a
longing to see the girl and a fierce dread of her sudden appearance.
She had forbidden any allusion to the subject years and years before,
and so had prevented herself from hea