"You will remember by-and-by, perhaps. Now tell me—have you forgotten all about Toby? Who is Toby?"
"He's a dog!" exclaimed Lily, her eyes opening wide, as some faint vision of a bygone time seemed to flash upon her suddenly.
"I thought you could not have forgotten poor old Toby. Is he a big dog or a little one? And what colour?"
"Oh, a big black dog, and so curly!" cried the child, with a little jump. "He carried me on his back when I was a baby."
"Many a time have I held you there," said Colonel Maxwell. He lifted the little girl in his arms, kissed her, and set her down again. Then he turned to the Vicar. "Mr. Sands, this settles the question."
"It certainly seems so," said Mr. Sands. "You are able to remind the child of things she might naturally remember. Mrs. Randal and her son have done their best to find out what were her recollections of her home, but without much success, I think."
"I am not surprised at that," said Colonel Maxwell. "She was backward as a little child, and very delicate. When she was three years old she could not talk much, and had very little memory. But she seems quick enough now. Mrs. Randal, you have taken good care of her."
"I've loved her like my own," said Mrs. Randal. "Of course, sir, John and me, we couldn't bring her up according to her station, which was plain to us from the first. But we've done our best to keep her from all common ways. I think, sir, there was things she remembered about her home, in a faint sort of way. One day she told John about being carried upstairs, and a blue lady on the wall as looked at her—a picture, I suppose."
"Her great-grandmother's picture. And she is like her," said Colonel Maxwell. He turned to Lily again, who was still holding his hand, looking from one to another, and listening with a puzzled face to all this talk which seemed to concern her.
"There were two little boys," he said. "One had dark brown hair, like the hair in your locket, and the other was fair like you. You used to play all together in the nursery. The eldest had a rocking-horse, and you wanted to ride like him. You wanted to ride his horse, and what did you say to him?"