"I thought you might get tired of such an old angel, Marie," laughed Mrs. Hamilton, "so I've brought a younger one along with me. Come here, Ruth, and let me make you acquainted with my friend, Marie Borel, who has left her Swiss mountains, and has come to America to do great things."
"Such great things I have done!" said Marie, reproachfully. "The first thing ees to get seeck so that my good aunt should have to take care of me. I do not like to make so much trouble."
"It is nothing," said her aunt affectionately as she patted the thin hand. "The uncle and I, we care only for your pain and trouble. It ees a pleasure to have you with us."
Marie looked at her with such loving gratitude in her soft eyes that her aunt retreated to the kitchen where Mrs. Hamilton followed her on the pretext of obtaining a promised recipe.
Left to themselves the girls chatted in friendliest fashion, and Ruth soon learned at least the outlines of Marie's story. Her father had been pastor in a quaint little town of French Switzerland, and there Marie had been born and had lived until death had taken both father and mother within a year. Then, heart-broken over her loss, she had accepted with gratitude an invitation from her aunt, who had gone to America with her husband when Marie was a little girl.
It was a trial of Ruth's self-control when Marie told so simply and pathetically of the death of her mother and father, for her own loss seemed so terribly near. "I've lost my mother, too, Marie," she said softly, "and my father has gone so far away that sometimes I feel quite alone."
"Ah, then you can understand how hard it is to be brave when one has so great a sorrow."
"Indeed I can. And I'm not always brave. But tell me what happened to you after you got here."
"Something, my grief, perhaps, or the voyage, made me so seeck. But it ees much better already, for now I can read a little and can also sew." As she spoke Marie took from a little bag lying by her side a piece of embroidery which to Ruth's eyes seemed a marvel of neatness and beauty.
"Oh, how lovely!" she said admiringly. "How can you do such fine even work?"