Their presence is like the
sunshine that warms and perfumes a conservatory; you inhale the odors of
roses, pinks, and climbing jessamines. Such a woman was Nellie Eastlake.
She was tall and winning. The marble heart of the Venus of Milo would
have warmed in her presence. Shakespeare would have said of her eyes,
"They do mislead the morn."
Mrs. Eastlake was in sympathy with the Harrises in their keen
disappointments. She possessed the tact to put Mr. Searles in the
happiest frame of mind, so that he half forgot his mission to America.
The Colonel also forgot, for the hour, that his family were absent, and
that his workmen in Harrisville were on a strike.
Mrs. Eastlake in her girlhood had converted all who knew her into ardent
friends. While at school on the Hudson, she met the rich father of a
schoolmate. Later she was invited to travel with this friend and her
father, Mr. Eastlake, a widower, among the Thousand Islands and down the
St. Lawrence River. She so charmed the millionaire that after graduation
at Smith College she accepted and married him. She was now journeying to
her palatial home on the Pacific Coast. She skilfully helped to guide the
table-talk, avoiding unwelcome topics.
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