There was a look in the lad’s face that made Polly’s heart contract with a pang.
She kept this new worry to herself, hoping, indeed, that she might be mistaken, and, above all, that her mother should not have the same idea as herself about Harold; but it was a trouble that she found very hard to bear, and that haunted her closely.
She was alone in the big desolate-looking house when the servant announced the arrival of Valentine Ambleton.
Her mother and Harold had gone out on a shopping expedition, devised by Polly to give them both some amusement, and she was occupied in walking about the large, half-empty drawing room, wondering for the hundredth time in what way she could utilize it so that it might bring some small addition to their limited exchequer, when the door opened and Valentine’s big form appeared.
Black was not the most becoming setting to Polly’s dark prettiness, and her humbly made black serge gown was fitted to a figure that had grown very, very thin of late. The girl had a fragile as well as a sad look, and Valentine had difficulty in recognizing the former little spitfire in this subdued young creature.
Sight of him, however, brought a kind of excitement to Polly, and as they sat and talked the old vivacity and color flashed into her eyes once again.
She had greeted him most naturally, but, of course, she was very outspoken.
“You have been a long time coming,” she informed him after a while; “but, truth to tell, I never expected you would come at all.”
“I should like to know why you thought that,” Val said.
“Oh! because so many people one meets stop and pretend they are glad to see one, and are dying to come and see one again, and they never come near the house. Not that I want any of them,” cried Polly, in her most independent manner; “but I hate and detest all who forget my mother.”