“As if—” Blue Bonnet laughed.
Just before going to bed, Blue Bonnet, in dressing gown and slippers, came to her aunt’s room.
Miss Clyde was sitting by one of the open windows, looking out at the soft, summer starlight, filled with the scent of the yellow and white honeysuckle covering the veranda below. She was thinking of the past ten months, wondering how deeply their teachings had taken root with Blue Bonnet.
“May I come in—for just a few moments?” Blue Bonnet asked. “I want to—talk;” and apparently forgetting that Miss Lucinda did not approve of her sitting on the floor, she dropped down beside her aunt’s chair, resting an arm on her lap, quite as though Aunt Lucinda were Grandmother. “I can talk so much better this way,” she said. “Please, Aunt Lucinda, I’m afraid I’ve been a lot of trouble to you—all these months. But it hasn’t had to be ‘Elizabeth!’ so very often lately, has it? You do think I’ve improved some?”
Miss Lucinda smiled. “I do not think that you have ever meant to be ‘a lot of trouble,’—the words are yours, not mine, my dear; and it has been a great comfort to both your grandmother and myself, having you with us.”
“And when I come back next fall, you’ll see—” Blue Bonnet said earnestly. “You’ve been ever so good to me, Aunt Lucinda—even if I didn’t—exactly think so—at the time. And I thought—maybe—we’d make this our real good-bye; because when Uncle Cliff and I get back from New York, it won’t be for much more than a stopping over.”
“But it is not to be good-bye,” Miss Lucinda laid a hand over Blue Bonnet’s—“only, until we meet again.”
“And,” Blue Bonnet added softly, as her aunt bent to kiss her, “‘Va Usted con Dios!’”
THE END.