Grace Atherton

"Blind! Richard blind! Oh, Edith;" and the bright color which had
stained Grace's cheeks when she knew that Richard had kissed her
flowers, faded out, leaving them of a pallid hue. Sinking into the
nearest chair, she kept repeating "blind--blind--poor, poor
Richard. It cannot be. Bring me some water, Rachel, and help me to
my room. This intensely hot morning makes me faint."

Rachel could not be thus easily deceived. She remembered an old
house in England, looking out upon the sea, and the flirtation
carried on all summer there between her mistress, then a beautiful
young girl of seventeen, and the tall, handsome man, whom they
called Richard Harrington. She remembered, too, the white-haired,
gouty man, who, later in the autumn, came to that old house, and
whose half million Grace had married, saying, by way of apology,
that if Richard chose to waste his life in humoring the whims of
his foolish father, she surely would NOT waste hers with him. SHE
would see the world!

Alas, poor Grace. She had seen the world and paid dearly for the
sight, for, go where she might, she saw always one face, one form;
heard always one voice murmuring in her ear, "Could you endure to
share my burden?"

No, she could not, she said, and so she had taken upon herself a
burden ten-fold heavier to bear--a burden which crushed her
spirits, robbed her cheek of its youthful bloom, after which she
sent no regret when at last it disappeared, leaving her free to
think again of Richard Harrington. It was a terrible blow to her
that he was blind, and talk as she might about the faintness of
the morning, old Rachel knew the real cause of her distress, and
when alone with her, said, by way of comfort, "Law, now, Miss Grace, 'taint worth a while to take on so. Like
'nough he'll be cured--mebby it's nothin' but them fetch-ed water-
falls--CAT-A-RATS, that's it--and he can have 'em cut out. I
wouldn't go to actin' like I was love-sick for a man I 'scarded
oncet."