MESHACH'S HOME.
Vesta had slept she hardly knew how long, but it was day, and slowly her
eyes turned towards the remainder of her bed to see if it was occupied.
The bridegroom was not there.
She reached her foot into her slipper at the bedside, and at one swift
step passed before her mirror, whispering:
"I have dreamed it all!"
The fresh, flushing skin, and radiant contrasts of hair and eyes seemed
so welcome to her in their perfect assurance of health, that she
whispered again:
"Have I dreamed it? He is not here. Oh, am I free?"
Then a feeling of reproval came to her as the minutest memory of that
wonderful yesterday rose to her mind, and the vow she had made to honor
and obey seemed to have been too easily repented. She looked upon her
hand, and the little, thin, pathetic thread of gold reaffirmed her
memory of the wedding-ring, and at the next suggestion a blush coursed
through her being like a redbird in the apple-blossoms: perhaps he had
stolen from her chamber stealthily as he came, while she, drowned in
deep slumber, wotted not.
A glance into the mirror again revealed those blushes repeating each
other, like the Aurora in the northern dawn, till, with a searching
consciousness, and her voice raised above the whisper, she said,
"Be still, silly _girl_!"
Opening the door, she found Virgie lying on the rug without, warmly
wrapped in her mistress's blanket-shawl, but wide awake.
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