“Tania has behaved very well, so far, hasn’t she, Madge?” Mrs. Curtis tactfully changed the subject. “I confess I am surprised. Philip Holt assured me that the child was continually in mischief in the tenement neighborhood where she lives. When he took her into the neighborhood house to try to help her she positively stole something. I am afraid Tania’s mother was not the woman you think she was; she was only a cheap little actress, a dancer.” Mrs. Curtis glanced at her companion. Madge was eyeing her seriously.
“It isn’t like you, Mrs. Curtis, dear, to say things against people. Philip Holt must have——” Madge stopped abruptly. At the same time Tom Curtis came up from behind to join his mother and the girl.
“Come on, Madge, and have a race with me across the sands,” he urged. “Mother will be trying to make you so grown-up that we can’t have any sport at all. Besides, you are looking pale. I am sure you need exercise. There is a crowd over there in front of the music pavilion. I will wager a five-pound box of candy that I can beat you to it. Philip Holt will entertain Mother. She likes him better than she does the rest of us, anyhow, because he devotes his time to good works and to working good people,” added Tom teasingly, under his breath.
While Tom was talking Madge darted off across the sands. She never would get over her love of running, she felt sure, until she was old and rheumatic. The color came back to her cheeks and the laughter to her eyes.
Tom was close behind her. “Madge Morton, you didn’t give me a fair start,” he protested, “you rushed away before I was ready. I thought you always played fair?”
Madge dropped into a walk. “I do try to, Tom,” she answered more earnestly than Tom had expected. His remark had been made only in fun. “You believe in me, don’t you, Tom?” she added pleadingly.
“Now and forever, Madge, through thick and thin,” answered Tom steadily.
They had now come up nearer the crowd of people on the beach. Up on a grand stand a band was playing an Italian waltz, and an eager crowd had gathered, apparently to listen to the music.
But the two young people soon saw that on the hard sand a child was dancing. Tom stopped outside the circle of watchers, but Madge went forward into it. She had at once recognized little Tania! Eleanor had been left on the houseboat to take care of the child, but Eleanor was now nowhere to be seen, and her charge had wandered into mischief.
Tania was dancing in her most bewitching and wonderful fashion. Madge could not help feeling a little embarrassed pride in her. The child was moving like a flower swayed by the wind. She poised first on one foot, then on the other, then flitted forward on both pointed toes, her thin, eager arms outstretched, curving and bending with the rhythm of the music. She wore her best white dress, the pride of her life, which Eleanor had lately made for her. On her head she had placed a wreath of wild flowers, which she must have woven for herself. They were like a fairy crown on her dark head. With the love of bright colors, which she must have inherited from some Italian ancestor, she had twisted a bright scarlet sash about her waist.