“I never felt I was—common till to-day,” she answered.
“Margery!”
She looked up quickly. Mr. Crosbie checked his words and laughed a little constrainedly.
“You must not grow vain,” he said.
“Am I vain? I will remember another time,” she responded, gravely.
“And remember this, too,” Stuart added—“that, whatever any one may say, my opinion of you does not change—never will.”
She smiled with delight.
“Thank you, Mr. Stuart,” she said, simply. “And now please give me my basket; you must not come any further.”
“I shall carry it home for you,” he answered. “We shall not be long, and this is tons too heavy for your little hands. Tell me of your lesson. What have you done to-day, and what is that book?”
Margery immediately broke into a long account of her studies, and, with her happy serenity restored, she walked on beside him, heedless of the dust or the sun—content that their friendship was unaffected.