Her companion sat in silence, too, holding the soft, warm hand which clung to hers with an eloquent supplication for protection and sympathy.
But youth and tears are foes who cannot abide long together, and by the time the little railway village of Wermesley was reached, Una’s eyes were full of interest and curiosity.
As the fly rumbled over the unkept streets toward the station, past the few tame shops and the dead-and-alive hotel, her color came and went in rapid fluctuations.
“Is—is this the world?” she asked, in a low voice.
Mrs. Davenant looked at her with a smile, the first which Una had seen on the thin, pale face. She had yet to learn that Mrs. Davenant never smiled in her son’s presence.
“The world, my dear?” she replied. “Well, yes; but a very quiet part of it.”
“And yet there are so many people in the streets, and—ah!” she drew back with an exclamation as the train shrieked into the station.
Mrs. Davenant started—she was nervous herself, and had not yet realized that she had for companion one who was as ignorant of our modern high-pressure civilization as a North American Indian.
“That is the train; don’t be frightened, my dear,” she said.
“Forgive me. I know it is the train—I have read about it. I am not frightened,” she added, quietly, and with a touch of gentle dignity that puzzled Mrs. Davenant.