Meantime Marguerite, in her wild and lonely home on the wooded banks of the great Potomac, lived a strange and dreamy life, taking long, solitary rides through the deep forests, and among the rocky hills and glens that rolled ruggedly westward of the river; or taking long walks up and down the lonely beach; wiled away to double some distant headland, or explore some unfrequented creek--or pausing lazily, dreamily to watch the flash and dip of the fish in the river, the dusky flight of the water fowl, or the course of a distant sail; getting home late in the afternoon to meet a respectful remonstrance from the elderly gentlewoman who officiated as her housekeeper, and a downright motherly scolding from her old black nurse, aunt Hapzibah, who never saw in the world’s magnificent Marguerite any other than the beautiful, wayward child she had tended from babyhood; or giving audience to the overseer, who, spreading the farm book before her, would enter into long details of the purchase or sale of stock, crops, etc., not one word of which Marguerite heard or understood, yet which she would at the close of the interview indorse by saying, “All right, Mr. Hayhurst, you are an admirable manager”--leaving her friends only to hope that he might be an honest man. But one circumstance seemed to have power to arouse Miss De Lancie’s interest--the arrival of the weekly mail at Seaview, the nearest village. All day, from the moment the messenger departed in the morning until he came back at night, Marguerite lingered in the house, or mounted her horse and rode in the direction from which the messenger was expected--or returned if it were dark, and waited with ill-concealed anxiety for his arrival. Upon one occasion, the mail seemed to have brought her news as terrible as it was mysterious. Upon opening a certain letter she grew deathly pale, struggled visibly to sustain herself against an inclination to swoon, read the contents to the close, threw the letter into the fire, rang and ordered horses and a servant to attend her, and the same night set out from home, and never drew rein until she reached Bellevue, when sending her horses back by her servant, she took a packet for New York.