Cornelia got up from the disordered bed, put it to rights
again, washed her stained face carefully, rearranged her hair, and went
down-stairs. All that afternoon she was cold, grave, and reserved;
inquiries after her health met with a chilling answer, and her friends
wisely concluded to leave her malady, whatever it were, to the cure of
time. As dinner progressed, Cornelia began to thaw: when Mr. Grumblow,
the member of Congress, requested her, with solemn and oppressive
courtesy, to do him the honor of taking a glass of wine with him, she
responded graciously; and as the toasts circulated, she first looked
upon her ideal resolves with good-humored tolerance, and then they
escaped her memory altogether. She became once more lively and
sparkling, and carried on what she imagined was a very brilliant
conversation with two or three people at once. By the time she was
ready to retire, she had practised anew the whole list of her
lately-abrogated accomplishments; and she wound up by picking the French
novel out of the corner into which she had disdainfully thrown it twelve
hours before, reading it in bed until she fell asleep, and dreaming that
she was its heroine. And yet she had not forgotten to wind up Bressant's
watch, and put it in its usual place under her pillow.
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