But the keen New England eyes of Minerva Poindexter had an instant appreciation of such characteristics of arriving fashions as could be gracefully adopted by her handsome mistress, whose best points she thoroughly understood, and even in a certain way admired, though as regarded herself, and indeed all the rest of womankind, she approved rigidly of that strict neutrality of surface, that ignoring of all merely corporeal points, which is so striking a characteristic of the monastic heavenly paintings of Fra Angelico. At the same moment, however, that her New England eyes were exercising their natural talent, her New England conscience, equally keen, made her a nurse of unmatched qualities, albeit she was perhaps something of a martinet. But with regard to her health Mrs. Rutherford rather liked to be domineered over. She liked to be followed about by shawls (her shawls were always beautiful, never having that niggardly, poverty-stricken aspect which such feminine draperies, when reserved for use in the house, are apt to assume); she liked to be vigilantly watched with regard to draughts; she liked to have her pulse felt, to have cushions, handsomely covered in rich colors, placed behind her well-dressed back. Especially did she like to be presented, at fixed hours, with little tea-spoonfuls of homoeopathic medicine, which did not taste badly, but which, nevertheless, it always required some urging to induce her to take; the urging--in fact, the whole system, regularly persevered in--could give variety to the dullest day. After greeting his aunt, Winthrop turned to speak to Celestine. By way of reply Celestine gave a short nod, and looked in another direction. In reality she was delighted with his notice, but this was her way of showing it. The two boys, Evert Winthrop and Lansing Harold, Mrs. Rutherford's nephews, had been her pets from childhood; but even in the old days her manner towards them had always been so curt and taciturn that they used to consider it a great triumph when they had succeeded in drawing out Minerva's laugh--for they always called her Minerva behind Mrs. Rutherford's back. It may be that this had had something to do with her liking for them; for, in her heart, Miss Poindexter considered her baptismal name both a euphonious and dignified one, and much to be preferred to the French frivolity of the title to which she was obliged to answer. "But where is Margaret?" said Mrs. Rutherford, turning. A third person, who had been looking at the new scene about her--the orange-trees, the palmettoes, the blue water of the Espiritu beyond the low sea-wall, and the fringe of tropical forest on Patricio opposite--now stepped from the carriage. "I was beginning to think that there had been some change of plan, Mrs. Harold, and that you had not come," said Winthrop, going back to the carriage to assist her.