Waitstill certainly would never
have examined Patty closely as to the state of her affections,
intimate as she was with her sister's thoughts and opinions about
life; she simply bided her time until Patty should confide in
her. She had wished now and then that Patty's capricious fancy
might settle on Philip Perry, although, indeed, when she
considered it seriously, it seemed like an alliance between a
butterfly and an owl. Cephas Cole she regarded as quite beneath
Patty's rightful ambitions, and as for Mark Wilson, she had grown
up in the belief, held in the village generally, that he would
marry money and position, and drift out of Riverboro into a
gayer, larger world. Her devotion to her sister was so ardent,
and her admiration so sincere, that she could not think it
possible that Patty would love anywhere in vain; nevertheless,
she had an instinct that her affections were crystallizing
somewhere or other, and when that happened, the uncertain and
eccentric temper of her father would raise a thousand obstacles.
While these thoughts coursed more or less vagrantly through
Waitstill's mind, she suddenly determined to get her cloak and
hood and run over to see Mrs. Boynton. Ivory had been away a good
deal in the woods since early November chopping trees and helping
to make new roads.
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