Part 7 (1/2)
”Pray,” she inquired suddenly, ”do you often scratch yourself--until you bleed?--'t is surely a most distressing habit.” Now glancing up suddenly, Barnabas saw her eyes were wonderfully bright for all her solemn mouth, and suspicion grew upon him.--”Did she know? Had she seen?” he wondered.
”Nevertheless, sir--my thanks are due to you--”
”For what?” he inquired quickly.
”Why--for--for--”
”For bringing you here?” he suggested, beginning to wring out his neckerchief again.
”Yes; believe me I am more than grateful for--for--”
”For what, madam?” he inquired again, looking at her now.
”For--your--kindness, sir.”
”Pray, how have I been kind?--you refused my neckerchief.”
Surely he was rather an unpleasant person after all, she thought, with his persistently direct eyes, and his absurdly blunt mode of questioning--and she detested answering questions.
”Sir,” said she, with her dimpled chin a little higher than usual, ”it is a great pity you troubled yourself about me, or spoilt your neckerchief with water.”
”I thought you were hurt, you see--”
”Oh, sir, I grieve to disappoint you,” said she, and rose, and indeed she gained her feet with admirable grace and dignity notwithstanding her recent fall, and the hampering folds of her habit; and now Barnabas saw that she was taller than he had thought.
”Disappoint me!” repeated Barnabas, rising also; ”the words are unjust.”
For a moment she stood, her head thrown back, her eyes averted disdainfully, and it was now that Barnabas first noticed the dimple in her chin, and he was yet observing it very exactly when he became aware that her haughtiness was gone again and that her eyes were looking up at him, half laughing, half shy, and of course wholly bewitching.
”Yes, I know it was,” she admitted, ”but oh! won't you please believe that a woman can't fall off her horse without being hurt, though it won't bleed much.” Now as she spoke a distant clock began to strike and she to count the strokes, soft and mellow with distance.
”Nine!” she exclaimed with an air of tragedy--”then I shall be late for breakfast, and I'm ravenous--and gracious heavens!”
”What now, madam?”
”My hair! It's all come down--look at it!”
”I've been doing so ever since I--met you,” Barnabas confessed.
”Oh, have you! Then why didn't you tell me of it--and I've lost nearly all my hairpins--and--oh dear! what will they think?”
”That it is the most beautiful hair in all the world, of course,”
said Barnabas. She was already busy twisting it into a s.h.i.+ning rope, but here she paused to look up at him from under this bright nimbus, and with two hair-pins in her mouth.
”Oh!” said she again very thoughtfully, and then ”Do you think so?”
she inquired, speaking over and round the hairpins as it were.
”Yes,” said Barnabas, steady-eyed; and immediately down came the curling lashes again, while with dexterous white fingers she began to transform the rope into a coronet.
”I'm afraid it won't hold up,” she said, giving her head a tentative shake, ”though, fortunately, I haven't far to go.”