“Why, no!” said Marie, with a fresh burst: “canst thou see thine own face?”
“What a silly child, to make such a speech as that!”
“No, Eva,” said Beatrice, trying to stifle her laughter, increased by Marie’s witticism: “the child is any thing but silly.”
“Well, I think you are all very silly, and I shall not talk to you any more,” retorted Eva, endeavouring to cover her retreat; but she was answered only by a third explosion from Marie.
Half an hour later, the Countess, entering her bed-chamber, was startled to find a girl crouched down by the side of the bed, her face hidden in the coverlet, and her sunny cedar hair flowing over it in disorder.
“Why, what—Magot! my darling Magot! what aileth thee, my white dove?”
Margaret lifted her head when her mother spoke. She had not been shedding tears. Perhaps she might have looked less terribly wan and woeful if she had done so.
“Pardon me, Lady! I came here to be alone.”
The Countess sat down in the low curule chair beside her bed, and drew her daughter close. Margaret laid her head, with a weary sigh, on her mother’s knee, and cowered down again at her feet.
“And what made thee wish to be alone, my rosebud?”