"And tease yourself with a false idea more often—why, you will imagine that I shall think differently of you presently."
"No—I don't think you will."
"Never, Mattie."
"God bless you for that!—if ever I'm in trouble I shall look to you to defend me."
"And in my trouble, Mattie?" was the half-laughing rejoinder.
"I'll think of you only, fight for you against all your enemies—die for you, if it will do any good. Oh! Miss Harriet, you are growing up a lady very far above me, getting out of my reach like, you won't forget the little girl you were kind to, and shut her wholly from your heart?"
Harriet Wesden was touched; ever a sensitive girl, the sight of another's sorrow struck home. She went back a step or two into the parlour.
"This isn't like the old Mattie," she said, "the Mattie who always looked at the brightest side of life, and made the best of every difficulty. Is that silly affair of the robbery still preying on your mind?"
"On your father's perhaps—not on mine."
"Then I'll fight the battle for you to begin with—if there be really one doubt in my father's heart, I'll charge it from its hiding-place to-night. Perhaps I have been wrapped up too much lately in my own selfish thoughts when I might have helped you, Mattie. Will you forgive me?"