"Now, Ruth," said Ralph Trulock, when dinner was quite over, "I want to have a little talk with you. I want you to tell me all about yourself and your father, for perhaps I may be able to help you to find out your people; but to do that I must know all about you. We must lose no time; for when winter comes what are you to do?"
"Winter's such a long, long way off," said Ollie. "What is the good of thinking of it yet? Don't fret, Ruthie!" and he stroked her cheek with his little brown hand.
"No, Ollie, I won't fret; but Mr. Trulock will help us, perhaps, to find our grandfather. May Ollie go and play in the garden, sir? he'll like that better than sitting quiet."
Ralph assented, and the boy went off quite happy. He had seen a lot of daisies in the ill-kept grass, and was soon at work making a daisy chain.
"If we talk about father, Ollie would cry," Ruth said. "He is so little, that if I don't talk, he forgets; and so I pretend to forget too. But I cannot help thinking very often how sorry father would be that we should be so poor, and that Ollie should not go to school any more. I have talked to Mrs. Cricklade, but though she is kind, she does not help me—she does not always understand. But I am sure, sir, that you will know what to do; and I am very, very grateful to you," she added, earnestly. She had such a pretty voice, low and gentle; Ralph felt more drawn to her every moment.
"Your father brought you to Southampton, Mrs. Cricklade told me," he said. "But, Ruth, do you tell me the whole story—all you know about yourself."
"We came from Canada first. I think I was born there, and I know my mother died there, though I don't remember it. I only remember father, even when I was quite young,—younger than Ollie is now. Father did everything for me; we were very poor, I think."
"That was in Canada?" asked Ralph.
"Yes, in Montreal. Father was in an office, but he was very badly paid, because he was a bad accountant. Then he got a letter. I remember that day well, because he was so pleased. He told me that when he was coming to Canada, the ship was wrecked, and many of the passengers lost. He could swim well, and when he had got my mother on shore, he went back and saved others—among them a young Frenchman, who must have been drowned but for him, because he couldn't swim at all. This young gentleman was very grateful, and he promised that when he became his father's partner, he would do something for father if he wanted help. So he wrote for him to go to Bordeaux."
"And you went? Was Ollie born then?"