With her eyes Merrylips followed this path. It made a narrow thread of darkness among the grasses that were white with dew, until it was lost in a hazel copse. Beyond the copse the sun was rising, and the sky was flushed with a strong red that dazzled her eyes, so that she had to turn them away.
Just at that moment Merrylips heard a sound of cautious footsteps on the path below, and a hoarse exclamation. She looked down, but she was so dazzled that for a second she could not see clearly. Then on the path below she saw Rupert standing. She was surprised, not only to see him there, but to see him alone, for she had thought that the voice that she had heard was not his, but Claus's.
Still, she could not stop to wonder about this, for here was Rupert, looking up at her with a piteous, startled face. She could not bear that for a single minute he should think her unfriendly, like the rest of the household.
"Good-morrow, Rupert!" she called gayly. "You're early afoot. Fie! So ill as you are, you should lie snug abed. My godmother will be vexed with you."
For a moment Rupert thrummed his battered cap and cast down his eyes.
"I stole forth. I was starved for a sup o' fresh air," he muttered. "But now—I will go back."
"Best so!" nodded Merrylips. "And oh, Rupert!" she leaned from her perch to add: "Ere noontime I'll have something rare to show you."
He looked up at her then, and blinked fast with his gray eyes. If he had been a younger boy, she would have said that he was almost crying.
So sorry did she feel for him that she was very near telling him about the cherry tart, but she checked herself, and tried another means of comfort.
"Rupert," said she, "would you like to see my crossbow? Old Roger gave 't me,—ay, and I can hit the white at twenty paces. Would it pleasure you to see it?"