“Even Sara's love may be only compassion,” she bitterly thought; but her father's nature was in the girl—his self-command—his proud reserve. Sara Derwent only thought her rather silent and cold.
There was a constraint on both—so much so that Olive heard, without testifying much pain, news which a few days before would have grieved her to the heart. This visit was a good-bye. Sara had been suddenly sent for by her grandfather, who lived in a distant county; and the summons entailed a parting of some weeks—perhaps longer.
“But I shall not forget you, Olive. I shall write to you constantly. It will be my sole amusement in the dull place I am going to. Why, nobody ever used to enter my grandfather's house except the parson, who lived some few miles off. Poor old soul! I used to set fire to his wig, and hide his spectacles. But he is dead now, I hear, and there has come in his place a young clergyman. Shall I strike up a little flirtation with him, eh, Olive?”
But Olive was in no jesting mood. She only shook her head.
Mrs. Rothesay looked with admiration on Sara. “What a blithe young creature you are, my dear. You win everybody's liking. I wish Olive were only half as merry as you.”
Another arrow in poor Olive's heart!
“Well, we must try to make her so when I come back,” said Sara, affectionately. “I shall have tales enough to tell, perhaps about that young curate. Nay, don't frown, Olive. My cousin says he is a Scotsman born, and you like Scotland. Only his father was Welsh, and he has a horrid Welsh name: Gwyrdyr, or Gwynne, or something like it. But I'll give you all information.”
And then she rose—still laughing—to bid adieu; which seemed so long a farewell, when the friends had never yet been parted but for one brief day. In saying it, Olive felt how dear to her had been this girl—this first idol of her warm heart. And then there came a thought almost like terror. Though fated to live unloved, she could not keep herself from loving. And if so, how would she bear the perpetual void—the yearning, never to be fulfilled?
She fell on Sara's neck and wept. “You do care for me a little—only a little.”
“A great deal—as much as ever I can, seeing I have so many people to care for,” answered Sara, trying to laugh away the tears that—from sympathy, perhaps—sprang to her eyes.