"She had not heard one word of Mr.
Howard's sermon, for keeping her book and dress and fur away from that little torment." Then followed the story in detail, how "Markham had sat in their seat, parading herself up there just for show, while Willie had kissed the picture of little Samuel in Asenath'a book and left thereon the print of his lips.

If Anna would have a maid, they did wish she would get one not quite so affected as Markham, one who did not try to attract attention by assuming the airs of a lady," and with this the secret was out.
Adah was too pretty, too stylish, to suit the prim Eudora, who felt keenly how she must suffer by comparison with her sister's waiting maid.
Even unsuspicious Anna saw the point, and smiling archly asked "what she could do to make Rose less attractive." In some things Anna could not have her way, and when her mother and sisters insisted that they would not keep a separate table for Markham, as they called Adah, she yielded, secretly bidding Pamelia see that everything was comfortable and nice for Mrs.Markham and her little boy.
There was hardly need for this injunction, for in the kitchen Adah was regarded as far superior to those who would have trampled her down, and her presence among the servants was not without its influence, softening Jim's rough, loud ways, and making both Dixson and Pamelia more careful of their words and manners when she was with them.

Much, too, they grew to love and pet the little Willie, who, accustomed to the free range of Spring Bank, asserted the same right at Terrace Hill, going where he pleased, putting himself so often in Mrs.Richards' way, that she began at last to notice him, and if no one was near, to caress the handsome boy.

Asenath and Eudora held out longer, but even they were not proof against Willie's winning ways.
It was many weeks ere Adah wrote to Alice Johnson, and when at last she did, she said of Terrace Hill: "I am happier here than I at first supposed it possible.

The older ladies were so proud, so cold, so domineering, that it made me very wretched, in spite of sweet Anna's kindness.