Two days later, at the time set in the afternoon, she stood in the small reception-room, to the left of the wide marble hall, waiting. The hushed splendor of the house would have impressed and awed her at any other time. But to-day her heart beat loud and her brain was preoccupied with its effort to keep her purpose clear, and yet not to be angered into revealing too much. The vast lower floor was loftier and more spacious than anything she had ever seen before. There were glimpses through many doors, and artificial elongations of perspective by means of mirrors. The long receding vista was touched with gleams of light on parquet flooring, reflections on the gray surfaces of mirrors, the curves of porcelain vases, the bosses of gilded frames. Over all hung the scent of flowers, that were massed here and there in Chinese bowls. Bessie’s step, and the accompanying rustle of brushing silks, brought the girl to her feet, rigid and cold. The widow swept into the room with extended hand. She was richly and correctly garbed in lusterless black, that sent out the nervous whisperings of crushed silks and exhaled a faint perfume. It was impossible to ignore the hand, and Mariposa touched it with her own for a minute. She had seen Bessie only once before, on the evening of the opera. The change wrought in her by grief and illness was noticeable. Her fine, healthy color had faded; her eyes were darkened, and there were many deep lines on her forehead and about her mouth. Nevertheless, a casual eye would have still noticed her as a woman of vigor, mental and physical. It was easy to understand how she had stood shoulder to shoulder with her husband in his fight for fortune. She motioned Mariposa to a chair facing the window, and studied her as she glibly accomplished the commonplaces of greeting. Her heart drew together with a renewed spasm of jealousy as she noted the girl’s superiority to her own daughter. What subtly finer qualities had Lucy had, that her child should be thus distinguished from the other children of Jake Shackleton? The indignation working against this woman gave a last touch of stateliness to poor Mariposa’s natural dignity of demeanor. She seemed to belong, by nature and birth, to these princely surroundings, which completely dwarfed Maud, and even made the adaptive Bessie look common. “My husband,” said the elder woman, when the beginnings of the conversation were disposed of, “was very much interested in you. He knew your father, Dan Moreau, very well.” Mariposa was becoming used to this phrase and could listen to it without the stare of surprise, or the blush of consciousness. “So Mr. Shackleton told me,” she answered.