“The dust, perhaps!”
“Dust or dirt,” said Hamilton, carelessly. “If Madame Berger cannot leave so early, we can send Hans with the carriage at a later hour; though I would rather she would stay at home as far as I am concerned.”
“I cannot believe that,” said Madame Rosenberg, “for I never saw you get on with anyone as you do with her; if I were the Doctor I would not allow it.”
“Nor I either, if I were the Doctor,” said Hamilton, laughing; “but he is not, perhaps, aware that her usual vivacity degenerates into romping when she is here, and she is much too young and much too pretty for anyone to expect that I——”
“Oh, after all there is no great harm; you only scamper about like a pair of children, but I should not like to see either Crescenz or Hildegarde doing the same.”
Hamilton looked at Hildegarde; there was something in the expression of her face which made him imagine that she, perhaps, had not quite approved of the scampering about of which her mother spoke.
“Am I to write an answer to this note?” she asked, as she took it out of Madame Rosenberg’s hand.
Her mother nodded her head, and left the garden. Hildegarde wrote, and Hamilton again leaned against the entrance of the arbour and looked in.
“Are you waiting for this letter too?” she asked, smiling.
“I was not thinking of it,” he replied. “I want to know if you, at least, believe that I would rather Madame Berger did not come here to-morrow?”