"I may never see another spring here," she said rather sadly once to Mysie. "I feel I'm a bit of the soil, but I shall have to depart when my legs are given back to me."
Mysie was loud in her laments.
"Don't try to get well! We can't spare you. Nobody wants you in India half so bad as Dad and I want you here."
But Rowena shook her head, and very soon her brother Ted received a letter from her which rejoiced his heart.
"DEAR OLD TED,—"
"My year is over! I can hardly believe it, and actually old Niddy-Noddy took it into his wise old head to take his holiday in Scotland this spring. Of course he came on to see me, and much against my will he brought some other old wiseacre from Edinburgh—a chum of his—and they examined me and poked me about, and were highly pleased with the result of my year's rest. I am at present like a baby trying to walk! I am to go slowly, but they say my unused muscles will harden in time, and my back is really cured. What a wonderful thing it is to have a body which will go! I never valued mine properly before, and I assure you I'm going to be very careful and cautious with such a precious possession now. My first walk was taken two days ago. Mysie and Granny nearly cried with the excitement of it. And I staggered and rolled like a drunken tar. But I'm walking more respectably now—only the fatigue of it! I ask myself am I a Rip Van Winkle, and have I spent a hundred years instead of one upon my bed?"
"Well, this is enough about my body."
"Now about plans. You and Geraldine are very impatient to have me. It is rather pleasant to feel I am wanted so much, and of course the thought of being with you so soon makes me want to dance a jig! This is May. Shall I come out the end of August? Will it be in the middle of the monsoon? But that will be a matter of indifference to me. I must tell you frankly that I shall say good-bye to the Highlands with real concern. My heart has been stolen by its soft air and elusive colours, and the dear simple Gaelic people, not to speak of the charming personality of Mysie Macdonald. And Granny and I have grown into each other's ways, so that it will be hard to snap ourselves asunder."
"I have written to the laird. He's in a predicament about his child, feeling that school has been a failure, and yet governesses are worse. I wish I knew a dear old motherly body who would teach and love the little darling with the same breath. How are your chicks? Grown out of knowledge, I expect. I can't believe that I shall be with you before very long now. Good-bye. My love and kisses to the batch of you. And tell Geraldine that I will stop in town and be fitted up with frocks before I sail, so as not to disgrace her. Your last cheque was far too generous."
"Ever your"
"ROWENA."
General Macdonald arrived over one afternoon. He had returned from town unexpectedly, and had told no one of his coming. Mysie was out when he came. Rowena received him in her green room. The couch was absent. At first he looked quite dazed when he saw a radiant vision crossing the room to meet him. Rowena looked so very much alive, as if every pulse in her body were beating with intense vitality.
"Don't you recognize me?" she said with her mellow laugh.
"Hardly. I did not realize you would be so tall. It is a resurrection. May I say how glad I am!"
His eyes met hers with smiling admiration, then when they were seated his brows contracted.
"Is it true that you're leaving this part for good?"