Roden was only thinking what a charming picture she made tricked out in all this red and gold of other days. She stood there before him like a beautiful present, clad in the garments of a past as beautiful. He felt a strange sensation of having stepped back into the time of Henry Esmond and the Virginians. He glanced down at his wrists, half expecting to see lace ruffles spring to adorn them, under the magic of the hour.
“You pretty child!” he said at last, “what on earth made you think of getting yourself up in this style?” But he knew that she was more than pretty. He would have liked to tell her so, only he was always very careful what he said to this little Virginian; and florid compliments, though perfectly adapted to the period of her costume, would smack of the familiar when considered under the lights of the nineteenth century.
He wondered at the radiance in her suddenly lifted face. How could he know that at last the so often asked question nearest to her heart was answered, and answered by him? He thought her pretty!
“I brought you the violin,” she said, turning away with an effort. “I reckon I’d better go ’n’ take off these things. They cert’n’y do look foolish—don’t they?”
“No, don’t,” said Roden. “You ought to humor an invalid, you know. You are so awfully nice to look at in that queer old gown.”
Dimples that he had never before seen, just born of joy, stole in and out about the corners of the girl’s red lips. She was more even than beautiful; she was enchanting. How ever had she come by all those old-time airs and movements? Had she perchance imbibed the spirit of the past with the air of the old house where she had always lived? Did some of those old grandes dames lean from the walls at night to teach her that subtle, upward carriage of the head?
He forgot all about the violin, and stood looking at her in wondering absorption.
“I—I’ve got a new song for you,” she said, presently, in a low voice. She seated herself sidewise at the piano, as though diffident of the furbelows that composed the back of her novel attire, striking at the same time noiseless chords with her left hand.
“You said you liked Scotch songs. I found this one in a old book that b’longed to my mother. She was Scotch. Mus’ I sing it?”