"We had all that out weeks ago, you know we did!" she whispered, apostrophizing that inner self that really wanted to break the brave compact. "When we knew we had to leave dear old Darrowtown, and Miss True Pettis, and Patsy Hope, and—and 'all other perspiring friends,' to quote Amoskeag Lanfell's letter that she wrote home from Conference.
"No, Ruth Fielding! Uncle Jabez Potter may be the very nicest kind of an old dear. And to live in a mill—and one painted red, too! That ought to make up for a good many disappointments—"
Her soliloquy was interrupted by a light tap upon her shoulder. Ruth glanced around and up quickly. She saw standing beside her the tall old gentleman who had been sitting two seats behind on the other side of the aisle ever since the train left Buffalo.
He was a spare old gentleman, with a gaunt, eagle-beaked face, cleanly shaven but for a sweeping iron-gray mustache, his iron-gray hair waved over the collar of his black coat—a regular mane of hair which flowed out from under the brim of his well-brushed, soft-crowned hat. His face would have been very stern in its expression had it not been for the little twinkle in his bright, dark eyes.
"Why don't you do it?" he asked Ruth, softly.
"Why don't I do what, sir?" she responded, not without a little gulp, for that lump would rise in her throat.
"Why don't you cry?" questioned the strange old gentleman, still speaking softly and with that little twinkle in his eye.
"Because I am determined not to cry, sir," and now Ruth could call up a little smile, though perhaps the corners of her mouth trembled a bit.
The gentleman sat down beside her, although she had not invited him to do so. She was not at all afraid of him and, after all, perhaps she was glad to have him do it.
"Tell me all about it," he suggested, with such an air of confidence and interest that Ruth warmed more and more toward him.