Part 23 (1/2)
”Will you lend me this?” she said at last, holding the epistle up.
”What are you going to do with it?” asked Dolly, disconsolately.
”I am going to ask Griffith to read it again. I shall be sure to see him to-morrow night.”
”Very well,” answered Dolly; ”but don't be too hard upon him, Aimee. He has a great deal to bear.”
”I know that,” said Aimee. ”And sometimes he bears it very well; but just now he needs a little advice.”
Troubled as she was, Dolly laughed at the staid expression on her small, discreet face; but even as she laughed she caught the child in her arms and kissed her.
”What should we do without you!” she exclaimed. ”We need some one to keep us all straight, we Vagabonds; but it seems queer that such a small wiseacre as you should be our controlling power.”
The mere sight of the small wiseacre had a comforting effect upon her.
Her spirits began to rise, and she so far recovered herself as to be able to look matters in the face more cheerfully. There was so much to talk about, and so many questions to ask, that it would have been impossible to remain dejected and uninterested. It was not until after tea, however, that Aimee brought her ”business” upon the carpet. She had thought it best not to introduce the subject during the earlier part of the evening; but when the tea-tray was removed, and they found themselves alone again, she settled down, and applied herself at once to the work before her.
”I have not told you yet what I came here for this afternoon,” she said.
”You don't mean to intimate that you did not come to see me!” said Dolly.
”I came to see you, of course,” decidedly; ”but I came to see you for a purpose. I came to talk to you about Mollie.”
Dolly almost turned pale.
”Mollie!” she exclaimed. ”What is the trouble about Mollie?”
”Something that puzzles me,” was the answer. ”Dolly, do you know anything about Gerald Chandos?”
”What!” said Dolly. ”It is Gerald Chandos, is it? He is not a fit companion for her, I know that much.”
And then she repeated, word for word, the conversation she had had with Ralph Gowan.
Having listened to the end, Aimee shook her head.
”I like Mr. Gowan well enough,” she said, ”but he has been the cause of a great deal of trouble among us, without meaning to be, and I am afraid it is not at an end yet.”
They were both silent for a few moments after this, and then Dolly, looking up, spoke with a touch of reluctance.
”I dare say you can answer me a question I should like to ask you?” she said.
”If it is about Mollie, I think I can,” Aimee returned.
”You have been with her so long,” Polly went on, two tiny lines showing themselves upon _her_ forehead this time, ”and you are so quick at seeing things, that you must know what there is to know. And yet it hardly seems fair to ask. Ralph Gowan goes to Bloomsbury Place often, does he not?”
”He goes very often, and he seems to care more for Mollie than for any of the rest of us.”
”Aimee,” Dolly said next, ”does--this is my question--does Mollie care for him?”
”Yes, she does,” answered Aimee. ”She cares for him so much that she is making herself miserable about him.”