Volume Ii Part 38 (1/2)
”and that is an honour you never made any pretensions to.”
”Come, you shall not say that any more,” said he, taking the kiss that Fleda had no mind to give him.
Half laughing, but with eyes that were all too ready for something else, she turned again to Hugh, when his brother had left the room, and looked wistfully in his face, stroking back the hair from his temples with a caressing hand.
”You are just as you were when I left you!” she said, with lips that seemed too unsteady to say more, and remained parted.
”I am afraid so are you,” he replied; ”not a bit fatter. I hoped you would be.”
”What have you been smiling at so this evening?”
”I was thinking how well you talked.”
”Why, Hugh! you should have helped me ? I talked too much.”
”I would much rather listen,” said Hugh. ”Dear Fleda, what a different thing the house is with you in it!”
Fleda said nothing, except an inexplicable little shake of her head, which said a great many things; and then she and her aunt were left alone. Mrs. Rossitur drew her to her bosom, with a look so exceeding fond that its sadness was hardly discernible. It was mingled, however, with an expression of some doubt.
”What has made you keep so thin?”
”I have been very well, aunt Lucy ? thinness agrees with me.”
”Are you glad to be home again, dear Fleda?”
”I am very glad to be with you, dear aunt Lucy!”
”But not glad to be home?”
”Yes, I am,” said Fleda; ”but somehow ? I don't know ? I believe I have got a little spoiled ? it is time I was at home, I am sure. I shall be quite glad after a day or two, when I have got into the works again. I am glad now, aunt Lucy.”
Mrs. Rossitur seemed unsatisfied, and stroked the hair from Fleda's forehead, with an absent look.
”What was there in New York, that you were so sorry to leave?”
”Nothing, Ma'am, in particular,” said Fleda, brightly; ”and I am not sorry, aunt Lucy ? I tell you, I am a little spoiled with company and easy living ? I am glad to be with you again.”
Mrs. Rossitur was silent.
”Don't you get up to uncle Rolf's breakfast, to-morrow, aunt Lucy.”
”Nor you.”
”I sha'n't, unless I want to; but there'll be nothing for you to do; and you must just lie still. We will all have our breakfast together when Charlton has his.”
”You are the veriest sunbeam that ever came into a house,”
said her aunt, kissing her.
CHAPTER XI.
”My flagging soul flies under her own pitch.”