“And won’t you have to work your way any more?” asked Mrs. Elwell, when she could get her breath.
“Oh, yes. I shall have to turn an honest penny for myself now and then,” said her nephew, smiling. “Tuition doesn’t cover all the expenses by a good deal, but it’s a big help. Why, I feel quite like a nabob.”
The name, with its sudden reminder of the one to whom Tom Saxon had mockingly given it in the summer, made Esther laugh. Morton Elwell, with his brown hands and common suit of clothes, did not look the character in the least.
“Well, I’m glad you are not a nabob,” she said, meeting his eyes, and then demurely dropping her own. “Please don’t go on to be one so fast that we can’t keep up with you. There are some of us that like the old ways and have to go slow.”
His face kindled, and he was on the point of saying something, when his aunt spoke. “Now you children just make yourselves at home,” she said, rising, “and I’ll go on and get the supper. I was just fixing to make some biscuits when you came, Esther. You’ll stay to supper, of course.”
“Oh, I must go home in a minute,” said the girl. For the first time in her life she felt a sudden timidity in the thought of a tête-à-tête with Morton Elwell. “Mother’ll expect me.”
“Now what makes you talk like that?” said Mrs. Elwell, in an injured tone. “Doesn’t she know where you are? Of course she won’t expect you. She knows I wouldn’t let you go home before supper. Why, you never used to do that way, and it’s ever so long since you were here.”
The logic was unanswerable, and Esther settled back in the chair from which she had half risen. “She’ll stay, Aunt Jenny,” said Morton, and he added, smiling at Esther, “weren’t you just saying that some of us liked the old ways?”
She took refuge in them swiftly when they were left alone. He must tell her all about himself, about college, what he had done to gain that scholarship, and what else he had done. She was all sympathy, all interest, with all the old responsiveness in her face, and he yielded himself to the warmth and joy of it as one yields to spring sunshine after the cold. She grew easier after the first, and presently there was no chance for embarrassment nor for confidences left; for the senior Elwell, with Morton’s young cousins, came into the room, and then the talk grew general, though with Morton still at the centre, as was the newcomer’s right, and indeed his necessity with Esther leading him on.
She was at her best—winsome, adroit, and determined if there was family pride in this uncle of his, it should bestir itself now. She had grown even prettier than she used to be, her manners even more charming, the young man said to himself, and the bounding happiness in her heart might well have made it true. For there had been a moment, just that moment before the others came into the room, when she had caught sure knowledge of the thing she had longed to know.