"Do you? But I do not know you."
"I am just what I used to be," the girl said briskly, raising her head.
"By your own shewing, _not_. The bird I left would have beat its wings lame against the bars of the cage I found it in."
"I did beat my wings pretty lame at first," said Rotha; "but not in this cage."
"In what one then?" he asked quickly.
"Oh--after you went away. I mean that time."
"What made the cage at that time?"
"Aunt Serena--and aunt Serena"s house."
"I was a little afraid of it. But I could not help myself. What did she do?"
Rotha hesitated a little.
"I do not think it is any use to go back to it now," she said. "It was partly my own fault. I had meant fully to do just as you said, and be polite and quiet and pleasant;--and I could not!"
"And so--?"
"And so, we had bad times. After aunt Serena kept me from seeing you and bidding you good bye, or even knowing that you were gone, I could not forgive her. And she knew she had wronged me. And that people do not forget."
"You thought I had too, eh?"
"No," said Rotha; "not then. I knew it was her doing."
"It was wholly her doing. Whenever I came and asked for you, I was always told that you were out, or sick in bed, or in some way quite unable to see me. And my going was extremely sudden, so that I had no time to take measures; other than to write to you and enclose my address."
"I never got it. And all those times I was always at home, and perfectly well, and sometimes--"
"Well--what?"
"Sometimes I was standing in the hall up stairs, leaning over the bal.u.s.ters and listening to your steps in the hall."
Colour rose in Rotha"s cheek, and her voice took a tone which told tales; and Mr. Southwode thought he did begin to recognize his little friend of old time.
"And then--" Rotha went on, "you know what I used to be, and can guess that I was not very patient."
"I can guess that. And what are you now?"
She flashed one of her quick looks at him, smiled and blushed. "I have grown a little older--" she said.
Mr. Southwode quite perceived that. He was inclined to believe that what he had before him was the ripened fruit which in its green state he had tried so hard to bring into the sun; grown sweet and rich beyond his hopes. He turned the conversation however, took up his paper again and read to Rotha a paragraph concerning some late events in Europe; from which they went off into a talk leading far from personal affairs, to the affairs of nations past and present, and branching off into questions of history and literature. And Mr. Southwode found again the Rotha of old, only with the change I have above indicated. The talk was lively for an hour, until lunch was served. It was served for them alone, in the room where they were. As they took their places at table and the meal began, for a few minutes there was silence.
"This is like--and not like--the old time," Mr. Southwode remarked smiling.
"I think it is more "not like,"" said Rotha.
"Why, pray?"
Rotha hesitated. "I said just now I had not changed; but in some things I have."
"Grown a little taller."
"A good deal, Mr. Southwode! And that is the least of the changes, I suppose."
"What are the others? Come, it is the very thing it imports me to know.
And the quicker the better. Tell me all you can."
"About myself?"
"I mean, about yourself!"
"That"s difficult."
"I admit it is difficult; but easier for a frank nature, such as yours used to be, than for another."
Meanwhile he helped her to things on the table, taking care of her in the manner he used to do in old time. It put a kind of spell upon Rotha. The old instinct of doing what he wished her to do seemed to be springing up in its full imperativeness.
"What do you want to know?" she asked doubtfully.
"Everything!"
"Everything is not much, in this case. I have lived most of the time, till last May, with Mrs. Mowbray; at school."
"What did you do at school?"
"Nothing. I _began_ to do, that is all. I have just begun to learn. Just began to feel that I was getting hold of things, and that they were growing most delightful. Then all was broken on ."
"That was last May?"
"Yes."
"Why do you suppose your aunt chose just that time to send you here?"
"I have no idea! She was going to Chicago, she said--"
"You know she did not go?"
"Did not go? She was in New York all this summer?"
"So I understood from herself In New York or near it."
"Then what _did_ she mean by sending me here, Mr. Digby? She did not know you were coming."