But Grace seemed always to understand that dreams were the great factor in Bertha’s happiness, and that she could not be happy without them. It was that power to understand which gave Grace the influence on her young cousin’s life. Bertha had not been at Duck Flats for a week before it had seemed quite possible to her to tell Grace everything that was in her heart. She had even confided in Mrs. Ellis the story of that one brave deed of hers which had brought so much discomfort to the three girls, and incidentally had left so much mortification behind it.
Bertha had never been able to tell Anne of what the German had told her, about how the stranger had left money with old Mrs. Saunders to be given to her for saving his life, but which the old woman had kept for her own private use.
“And I have always felt quite certain that the old woman could have told me of his whereabouts if she had liked, only she was afraid that he would find out about her keeping the money,” said Bertha. “But what I never could understand was why he never came to see what had become of his coat and his diamonds.”
“Diamonds?” echoed Grace, in amazement. “My dear Bertha, what are you talking about?”
“They may not be diamonds at all, nothing, in fact, but pebbles from the Micmac shoals,” laughed Bertha. “But you shall see them, and then you will be able to tell me, perhaps.”
She went off to her room and unearthed the coat and the little case from among her belongings, and then told Grace how the man had thrown the coat round her because she shivered so; she had run home in it, and then it had lain in a corner of her room until she was well.
“They are diamonds, I am sure of it,” said Mrs. Ellis, in a tone of conviction. “Tom had an uncle, an old Welshman, who had some choice uncut diamonds in his possession, and Tom has often told me that they looked just like dirty pebbles, only they were so very, very hard, that they could not possibly be mistaken by anyone who had any knowledge of such things. Do you mind if I tell Tom about these, and ask him to look at them?”
“Of course not. But it does make me so fearfully uncomfortable to have the things in my possession like this. I feel as if I had stolen them,” said Bertha, who was very much relieved because at last the story was off her mind, and the knowledge shared by someone else.
Grace laughed. “Oh, you poor little Bertha, you are the sort of child that it takes a mother to understand. I expect that Anne and Hilda would about cry themselves blind if they thought they had in any way failed in their duty to you, and yet, poor girls, they could never get at the heart of you, while you have opened out to me like the rosebuds to the sun.”
Bertha shuffled uneasily. “It was my fault, of course,” she said stiffly. “But I had a downright morbid dislike of being laughed at or criticised, so I mostly kept things to myself.”