"Did Lottchen hurt you, then? She's apt to be clumsy."
"She's rather a pretty child and doesn't look clumsy."
"She's the dearest little thing in the world, but it doesn't do to make too much of her. Every one spoils her because she's so pretty and looks so fragile. She isn't really delicate and can be no end of a romp, and is quite able to take her own part. She wants to go to school, and she'd have gone before if it hadn't been for the war and Nessa being here as her governess. You never saw anything like the way she loves Nessa."
I wasn't caught napping this time. "Nessa? And who's Nessa?" I asked with a frown of perplexity.
"Nessa Caldicott, an English girl who——"
"An English girl here, in this house, at such a time!" I exclaimed, lost in amazement.
"Yes, of course; in this house; and at such a time," she repeated, imitating my manner. "Have you any objection?"
"Of course not; but——" and I gestured to suggest anything.
"I wanted to talk to you about her. That's the one reason why I wasn't altogether sorry to hear you were in the Secret Service;" and then she told me that she and Nessa had been at school together, and how, when she found Nessa had had to leave her friends and could not get permission to go back to England, she had brought her home as Lottchen's governess. "She was in awful trouble, of course, and mother hated the idea of her coming to us; but I got my own way. That's about two months ago, and ever since we've been doing all we can to get her sent home."
This sent Rosa up many hundreds per cent. in my estimation. "I think it was awfully good of you; but why can't she go home?"