"Miss Kavanagh," says he, "is she well—happy?"
"She is well," says Barbara, stopping to look back at him with her hand on Mabel's shoulder—there is reservation in her answer.
"Had she any idea that I would call to-day?" This question is absolutely forced from him.
"How should she? Even I—did I know it? Certainly I thought you would come some day, and soon, and she may have thought so, too, but—you should have told me. You called too soon. Impatience is a vice," says Mrs. Monkton, shaking her head in a very kindly fashion, however.
"I suppose when she knows—when," with a rather sad smile, "you tell her—I am to be here on her return this afternoon she will not come with you."
"Oh, yes, she will. I think so—I am sure of it. But you must understand, Felix, that she is very peculiar, difficult is what they call it now-a-days. And," pausing and glancing at him, "she is angry, too, about something that happened before you left last autumn. I hardly know what; I have imagined only, and," rapidly, "don't let us go into it, but you will know that there was something."
"Something, yes," says he.
"Well, a trifle, probably. I have said she is difficult. But you failed somewhere, and she is slow to pardon—where——"
"Where! What does that mean?" demands the young man, a great spring of hope taking life within his eyes.
"Ah, that hardly matters. But she is not forgiving. She is the very dearest girl I know, but that is one of her faults."