His face looked worn and weary, but Rowena saw that he had improved in health and spirits. His step was brisker, he held himself more alertly.
Mysie looked up at him affectionately.
"Dad has been so kind," she informed Rowena; "he used to play halma with me in bed, and told me stories, almost as good as yours."
When she had been packed off to bed, her father began to talk about her.
"She has not the constitution for a town life, and the doctors advised me to let her go easily for the next year. The schoolmistress said she was, if anything, too eager and quick over her lessons; but her appetite failed, and she had constant headaches; and then, in this last spell of extreme cold, she did not seem to have the strength to withstand it. I don't want to lose her. Do advise me. What shall I do? Not try another governess?"
Rowena laughed.
"Let me have her. We shall be company for each other, and then you roam the world as you will. I don't believe you will settle down here."
"I want to do something with my life," said the General earnestly. "I'm not keen about politics, I'm afraid; but I've been offered a post by a friend of Cavanagh's. It has to do with the welfare of the deserving unemployed, and they want me to be secretary. It will entail a few months in town, and a good deal of travelling round, but I shall feel I am working again. At the same time, I am not going to live entirely apart from my child, and I have my duties as a landlord here. So the spring will see me opening the house again. I will gladly leave Mysie with you till then."
The matter was settled, and he departed.
Rowena and Mysie were supremely content. The child's rapture at being in the Highlands again was extremely touching.