isreputable and vociferous crowd of New York hack
drivers, that swarmed upon the pier as the _Massachusetts_ glided
into her dock, it was good to see that subduedly respectable and
consciously private and superior man in the drab overcoat and the
nice gloves and boots, who came forward and touched his hat to Mrs.
Oferr, took her shawl and basket, and led the way, among the
aggravated public menials, to a handsome private carriage waiting on
the street.

"All well at home, David?" asked Mrs. Oferr.

"All well, ma'am, thank you," replied David.

And another man sat upon the box, in another drab coat, and touched
_his_ hat; and when they reached Waverley Place and alighted, Mrs.
Oferr had something to say to him of certain directions, and
addressed him as "Moses."

It was very grand and wonderful to order "David" and "Moses" about.
Laura felt as if her aunt were something only a little less than
"Michael with the sword." Laura had a susceptibility for dignities;
she appreciated, as we have seen out upon the wood-shed, "high
places, and all the people looking up."

David and Moses were brothers, she found out; she supposed that was
the reason they dressed alike, in drab coats; as she and Frank used
to wear their red merinos, and their blue ginghams. A little spasm
did come up in her throat for a minute, as she thought of the old
frocks and the old times already dropped so far behind; but Alice
and Geraldine Oferr met her the next instant on the broad staircase
at the back of the marble-paved hall, looking slight and delicate,
and princess-like, in the grand space built about them for their
lives to move in; and in the distance and magnificence of it all,
the faint little momentary image of Frank faded away.

She went up with them out of the great square hall, over the stately
staircase, past the open doors of drawing-rooms and library,
stretching back in a long suite, with the conservatory gleaming
green from the far end over the garden, up the second stairway to
the floor where their rooms were; bedrooms and nursery,--this last
called so still, though the great, airy front-room was the place
used now for their books and amusements as growing young
ladies,--all leading one into another around the skylighted upper
hall, into which the sunshine came streaked with amber and violet
from the richly colored glass. She had a little side apartment given
to her for her own, with a recessed window, in which were blossoming
p