Salome was silent, feeling rather disappointed at this douche of cold water over her schemes of authorship.
"But, Reg, if stories are to be like life, they must be the same things told over and over again, just as things do go on happening over and over again. For instance, all that is happening to us now has happened to thousands and thousands of other families,—may be happening at this very moment. The thing is," said Salome thoughtfully, "it is the way of telling a story which makes the difference. We see things differently, and then we put the old thing in a new light. That is why there is everything fresh every day, and nothing can be really stale, as you call it. All this beautiful view never can look quite the same, for there is certain to be a variety in the lights and shadows."
"Oh, well, I daresay; but then I am not sentimental or romantic, though I think you are awfully clever, and would beat Ada, or any of us, any day. I wonder how I shall get on at the college? It will be very different to Rugby. I must work hard and make the best of the year, for I am only to have a year more at school. Did not Uncle Loftus say so?"
"Yes; but perhaps it may turn out differently. You are sure to get on, whatever happens. It is about Raymond I am so afraid. I cannot imagine him in an office in Harstone.—How that girl is staring at me, Reginald, and the boy too. Is it at my hair?"
"Come along," said Reginald; "don't look at them."
He turned towards the low wall which skirts the side of the down where the high rocks, through which the river runs, rise to a considerable height on the Roxburgh side. Reginald leaned with folded arms against the wall, and Salome, uncomfortably conscious that her hair was floating over her back in most dire confusion, stood by him, never turning her head again. At last Salome heard a voice close to her say,—
"Yes, I am sure it is, Digby. Let me ask her."
"Nonsense. You can't be sure."
There was a moment's silence, and then Kate Wilton seized on her chance. Salome's pocket-handkerchief, as she turned at a sign from Reginald to walk away, fell from the pocket at the side of her dress.
"I think this is yours," said Kate, "your pocket-handkerchief; and I think you are my cousin. We—we came to see you at Maplestone two years ago."