“The rain spoils a good many things here,” he said, with sudden gravity. “You don’t look nearly so well as you did a fortnight ago, Miss Christie, and I expect it is the damp of this place. You might as well live in a cave, you know, as in that house in a rainy season,” he added, dropping his voice. “Don’t you find yourself that your health is affected by it?”
I hesitated.
“It is damp, I know; but it isn’t half so bad for me, who am strong, as it is for Mrs. Rayner or for little Haidee.”
“But they can’t help themselves, poor things, while it lies in your own power whether you will put up with it or not.”
“You mean that I ought to go away?”
“No, no, I don’t mean that,” said he hastily.
“But that is what you advised me to do,” said I, looking up, surprised.
“Did I? Ah, yes! But, now that you have grown attached to—to—the place, and—and Mrs. Rayner—”
“No, indeed I haven’t,” I interrupted. “I don’t like her at all.”
“Well, to Haidee, or the baby. You must have grown attached to something or to somebody, or you wouldn’t talk as if you didn’t want to leave the place,” he said, with such abrupt earnestness as to be almost rude.