Part 34 (2/2)

Yours always, Naa.

The line enclosed from Ruhannah touched him deeply:

I cannot speak of it yet. Please, when you go to Brookhollow, have flowers planted. You know where our plot is. Have it made pretty for them.

Rue.

He wrote at once exactly the sort of letter that an impulsive, warm-hearted young man might take time to write to a bereaved friend.

He was genuinely grieved and sorry for her, but he was glad when his letter was finished and mailed, and he could turn his thoughts into other and gayer channels.

To this letter she replied, thanking him for what he had written and for what he had done to make the plot in the local cemetery ”pretty.”

She asked him to keep the keys to the house in Brookhollow. Then followed a simple report of her quiet and studious daily life in the home of the Princess Mistchenka; of her progress in her studies; of her hopes that in due time she might become sufficiently educated to take care of herself.

It was a slightly dull, laboured, almost emotionless letter. Always willing to s.h.i.+rk correspondence, he persuaded himself that the letter called for no immediate answer. After all, it was not to be expected that a very young girl whom a man had met only twice in his life could hold his interest very long, when absent. However, he meant to write her again; thought of doing so several times during the next twelve months.

It was a year before another letter came from her. And, reading it, he was a little surprised to discover how rapidly immaturity can mature under the shock of circ.u.mstances and exotic conditions which tend toward forced growth.

Mon cher ami:

I was silly enough to hope you might write to me. But I suppose you have far more interesting and important matters to occupy you.

Still, don't you sometimes remember the girl you drove home with in a sleigh one winter night, ages ago? Don't you sometimes think of the girl who came creeping upstairs, half dead, to your studio door? And don't you sometimes wonder what has become of her?

Why is it that a girl is always more loyal to past memories than a man ever is? Don't answer that it is because she has less to occupy her than a man has. You have no idea how busy I have been during this long year in which you have forgotten me.

Among other things I have been busy growing. I am taller by two inches than when last I saw you. Please be impressed by my five feet eight inches.

Also, I am happy. The greatest happiness in the world is to have the opportunity to learn about that same world.

I am happy because I now have that opportunity. During these many months since I wrote to you I have learned a little French; I read some, write some, understand pretty well, and speak a little. What a pleasure, _mon ami_!

Piano and vocal music, too, occupy me; I love both, and I am told encouraging things. But best and most delightful of all I am learning to draw and compose and paint from life in the Academie Julian! Think of it! It is difficult, it is absorbing, it requires energy, persistence, self-denial; but it is fascinating, satisfying, glorious.

Also, it is very trying, _mon ami_; and I descend into depths of despair and I presently soar up out of those depressing depths into intoxicating alt.i.tudes of aspiration and self-confidence.

You yourself know how it is, of course. At the criticism today I was lifted to the seventh heaven. ”_Pas mal_,” he said; ”_continuez, mademoiselle_.” Which is wonderful for him. Also my weekly sketch was chosen from among all the others, and I was given number one. That means my choice of _tabourets_ on Monday morning, _voyez vous_? So do you wonder that I came home with Suzanne, walking on air, and that as soon as _dejeuner_ was finished I flew in here to write to you about it?

Suzanne is our maid--the maid of Princess Naa, of course--who walks to and from school with me. I didn't wish her to follow me about at first, but the Princess insisted, and I'm resigned to it now.

The Princess Mistchenka is such a darling! I owe her more than I owe anybody except mother and father. She simply took me as I was, a young, stupid, ignorant, awkward country girl with no experience, no _savoir-faire_, no clothes, and even no knowledge of how to wear them; and she is trying to make out of me a fairly intelligent and presentable human being who will not offend her by _gaucheries_ when with her, and who will not disgrace her when in the circle of her friends.

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