Volume Ii Part 77 (2/2)
”Stop anywhere you please, Endy,” she said honestly. ”I was very glad you came to Mr. Simlins'.”
”Would you rather get it from Mrs. Davids?” he inquired demurely.
”No, not rather. Whichever you like, Endecott,” Faith said, hiding the start which the question in this real form gave her. The afternoon sun through which they were riding was very bright; the washed leaves were brilliantly green; sweet scents of trees and buds filled the air, and opening apple blossoms were scattering beauty all over the land.
Nothing could spoil that afternoon. Faith had a secret consciousness besides that the very thing from which she shrank was by no means disagreeable to Mr. Linden. She did not care what he did! And he,--in the joy of being with her, of seeing her grow stronger every hour, Mr.
Linden was in a 'holiday humour'--in the mood for work or play or mischief; and took the road to Miss Bezac's for more than a gla.s.s of milk.
”Mignonette,” he said, ”what varieties of pride do you consider lawful and becoming?”
”I know only a few innocent sorts,” said Faith,--”that I keep for myself.”
”Luxurious child! 'A few innocent sorts of pride that you keep for yourself'! You must divide with me.”
How Faith laughed.
”You wouldn't thank me for one of them all, Endecott. And yet--” She stopped, and coloured brilliantly on the sudden.
”Explain and finish,” said Mr. Linden laconically.
”If I told you what they are you would laugh at me.”
”That would not hurt me. What are they, Mignonette?”
She spoke gravely, though smiling sometimes; answering to the matter of fact, as she had been asked. ”I am proud, a little, of very fine rolls of b.u.t.ter, or a particularly good cheese. I think I am proud of my carnations, and perhaps--” she went on colouring--”of being so good a baker as I am. And perhaps--I think I am--of such things as sewing and dressmaking;--but I don't think there is much harm in all that. I know myself sometimes proud of other things, where I know it is wrong.”
”How do you know but I am proud of your rolls of b.u.t.ter too?” said Mr.
Linden looking amused. ”But Mignonette, what called forth such a display of the carnations you are _not_ proud of? What was the force of that 'And yet'?”
It brought the colour again, and Faith hesitated and looked puzzled, Then she tried a new way of escape.
”Don't you mean to let me have any of my thoughts to myself?” she said playfully.
”Don't you mean to let me have any of them for myself?”
”You?--Haven't you them almost all?”
”My dear I beg pardon!--one for every carnation,--but I did not know that I had so nearly made the tour of your mind. I was under the impression that my pa.s.sports were not yet made out--and that my knowledge of your thoughts was all gained from certain predatory excursions, telescopic observations, and such like illegal practices. I am sure all my attempts to cross the frontier in the ordinary way are met by something more impa.s.sable than a file of bayonets.”
Faith looked up at him as if to see how much of this was meant for true.
”But,” said she naively, ”I feel as if I had been under a microscope.”
”My dear!” said Mr. Linden again, with an air at once resigned and deprecating. But then his gravity gave way. ”Faith!--is _that_ your feeling in my company? I wonder you can endure the sight of me.”
”Why?”--said she timidly.
”If I seem to you like a microscope.”
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