Thus adjured, Bruce told her the story of his visit to Mr. Dexter’s house and the strangely familiar look that the place had worn; and he told her, too, of the conversation that he had had with Charley Weyman and of the advice that the latter had given him. Laura listened to his words with the deepest attention, and when he had finished, she drew a long breath and said, “that’s the most interesting, romantic thing I ever heard about in all my life. And you don’t really know who your folks are? Why you might be almost anybody in the world, and maybe you’re the prince who will come and waken up the princess with a kiss, the same as in the story book. But how are you going to work to find out what it all means? You must tell me everything you do about it for I’ll never be able to sleep at night until you’re restored to your rights.”
Bruce tells Laura the story of his visit to Mr. Dexter’s house.—Page [72].
Bruce, who was of a rather practical turn of mind, was amused at the excitement of his more imaginative companion. Up to this moment he had simply felt a curiosity to learn why it was that the Dexter homestead seemed familiar to him, and it had never occurred to him that he had any particular “rights” to be restored to him, or that any grave question depended on the fancied resemblance of the place to the one pictured in his memory.
“I would like very much to learn something about Mr. Dexter and his old house, but I don’t know how to go about it. I always lived in the country, and, outside the men in our fire company, I have no friends or even acquaintances in New York. You have lived here all your life, and everything seems natural to you, but you’ve no idea what a big, lonely, desolate place this city is to a boy like me who comes here as a stranger.”
“I’ll tell you what,” exclaimed Laura suddenly, “when my papa comes home to-night—you know you’re going to stay to dinner with us—you ask him about Mr. Dexter but don’t tell him that you said a word to me about it. Maybe he’ll tell you something that will be of some use to you, but don’t say a word to him about what you told me about your visit there. We must keep that for our own secret, and I shall be mad if you tell him or Harry or anybody else, and if I get mad I won’t help you to find out the mystery of it. Now, you must do just what I tell you or else I won’t like you any more.”
“What secret are you talking about?” demanded some one close beside them in a voice so loud that both Laura and Bruce started in surprise from their seats. It was Harry who had just been released by his tutor and had been, according to his own account, hunting them all over the grounds.
Laura put her finger on her lips and threw a significant glance at Bruce, and so it happened that Harry learned nothing of what they had been talking about for fully half an hour.
At six o’clock, Mr. Van Kuren reached home. He shook hands with Bruce and told him he was glad to see him and thanked him for his kindness to Harry.
Bruce noticed that both children appeared to stand in wholesome awe of their parent, obeying him with the utmost alacrity and conversing only in low tones while he was present. This was not surprising to the young visitor, for Mr. Van Kuren impressed him as a stern, silent, self-contained man, who might be very severe if he chose to. But his face was not unkind, and in the few remarks that he addressed to his guest he showed a certain interest in his welfare and a desire to make him feel as much at home as it was possible for a shy, country boy, unaccustomed to the ways of society, to feel in a splendid house like the one in which he found himself now. But all idea of asking him about the Dexter mansion left his mind, and although he found himself alone with him for a few moments before dinner was announced, he simply did not dare to broach the subject that was uppermost in his mind.