“One day when I was walking with my sister Eva, she leaned out of her carriage, and looked after us in a strange earnest way, that made Eva pull down her veil. The next-day, as I was going along by the garden-fence, the lady was close by me picking flowers on the other side. I suppose my eyes looked greedy for them, for she called to me in a kind, sweet way, and reached some of her flowers through the railing. I was afraid to touch them at first; but she smiled, and said, Old Storms had told her how I loved to hang about the railing, and that I had a young lady with me once, who seemed as fond of flowers as I was.
“Oh! I said, a thousand times more so. Eva loves them better than anything in the world. When I said Eva, the lady seemed to grow restless, and dropped some of her flowers without noticing it.”
“That’s a singular name,” she said, “that is——”
“That is, for poor people, I said, when she stopped, as if afraid of hurting my feelings. Yes, we all know that; but then our Eva never seemed like poor people. Everybody thinks she is a lady—and so she is, every inch of her.
“The madam smiled when I said this, and her face grew red as a rose all in a minute, as if I had been praising her instead of Eva, which wasn’t likely, being only a little boy, and she a splendid lady. Then she asked me about my father who was killed, sir, when we needed him most; and about my mother who was working so hard to keep us together, and said that perhaps she would come some time and see our garden, if it was so pretty; but she never came.”
The stranger listened to that frank, young voice with gentle interest, asking a few questions now and then, always calculating to draw out some detail about the lady of the great house, but without directly alluding to her.
“But since then you have been to the house?”
“Yes, sir, after I went into business. That was what took me there to-day.”
James spoke guardedly, now he remembered that what he had overheard was not his to tell. The stranger showed no disposition to carry the subject further, but fell into thought, and moved forward as if he had been alone.
“There, there! you see Eva’s morning glories running up the window,” cried the boy.