Rhoda bent her head without speaking. And the nurse, though she reproached herself for the feeling and said to herself that it was ‘rubbish,’ felt a momentary wonder whether it would not have been better for Sir Robert, with his studious habits and his grave demeanour, to have loved an earnest, simple little girl like the blue-eyed, fair-haired Rhoda with the devotion in her eyes, rather than the brilliant and slightly disturbing creature whom he had chosen for his wife.
CHAPTER II.
RHODA PEMBURY’S DISCOVERY
The day after this conversation with Bessie, Rhoda was allowed downstairs for the first time. Sir Robert was kindness itself to her, though he was rather puzzled by the extreme reserve and timidity of the girl whose life he had saved, never guessing, in his masculine obtuseness, at the sentimental cause of her rather perplexing demeanour.
Jack Rotherfield, who was staying with his guardian, was delighted to welcome a new and pretty guest, and at once proceeded to exert himself to amuse and interest the convalescent, so that old Bessie used to smile demurely when she came into the room where the two young people would be sitting together, Rhoda gentle and rather listless, Jack energetically trying to rouse her from the somewhat abstracted state in which she still remained.
Rhoda laughed at the idea of falling in love with Jack, a possibility which Bessie plainly foresaw and made no scruple about mentioning.
“He’s very nice,” she said, “and, I suppose, very good-looking. But I don’t like him as much as I ought to do, considering how kind he is. He always seems to me to be saying things to me which he must have said before.”
Bessie looked surprised.
“Lor, miss, that’s not a bad guess, I’m afraid, if it is a guess,” she admitted. “Mr. Jack is so nice-looking, and so merry and bright, that the young ladies do make a fuss of him. Even Lady Sarah,” she added in a rather lower tone.
A deep flush at once overspread Rhoda’s face.
“I should hardly think,” she said quite tartly, “that a girl who had the good fortune to be liked by Sir Robert would care much for Mr. Rotherfield.”