Then did “Forty-niner” toss back his grizzled head and laugh. How he did laugh! Almost as if he were at that moment on the broad plain of Sobrante where none would be disturbed because of a little noise. And said he:
“Good! Good enough! I like you, Tippy, I plumb do like you. You’re straight and white, almost as white as a Yankee. But I’d give all my old shoes to see the ‘boys’’ faces when you arrive in their midst. When you try to buttle your butlery in their presence—I tell you, Tippy, you’ll strike it rich! If ’twasn’t for turnin’ my back on the ‘Little Captain,’ now, when she’s going to need me the most, I’d join the homeward-bound myself just to be on hand when that bottle-green-and-poppy-yeller livery hits the ranch! Oh! Shucks!”
Again that uncontrollable laughter seized him, fancying the face of Samson the mighty, when Tipkins the haughty should appear before him; and bending himself double he retreated lest this untimely mirth should jar upon the feelings of others, to whom this day brought grief.
In the handsome drawing-room of Madame Mearsom, Mrs. Dalrymple, Gabriella, and poor Jessica gathered for a last embrace. Madam herself supported them by the kindly dignity of her deportment—exactly what that deportment should have been at such a time and such a moment. One glance at her countenance showed her eminently fitted to assume the charge and education of a “young lady of the higher class,” it was so benign, so composed, and so intelligent.
But Jessica had scarcely looked at her. She had eyes, at that moment only for that beloved face of her mother which would vanish in a moment and leave her alone.
Hark! The door has already closed! the dear face has vanished! “Little Captain” is alone! On the threshold of a new, unknown life.
CHAPTER XIII.
JESSICA ENTERS SCHOOL.
“Now, my dear, I will introduce you to your mates.”
Jessica caught her breath with a sob, but her blue eyes were dry and her face piteously white and grief-stricken. This second parting from her beloved mother had been harder than the first. It was with a feeling of utter desolation that she followed Madam Mearsom into the pleasant recreation-room where most of the pupils of the school were gathered.