“I don’t care to tell you anything about myself,” she said, “because it’s so uninteresting. My father has been dead a great many years; mama is delicate; and we live in Paris so that I may study painting and the younger girls may have lessons. We go to America for the summers. My brother is the eldest of us, and he lives there. The younger girls are pretty, and mama wishes them to go into society and to be admired. She used also to wish this for me, but she saw how I hated it, and how little chance I had in it, so she lets me alone now, particularly since I got Harold to speak to her.”
“Are you sure that she would not disapprove of your friendship with me, knowing of me only the little that you are able to tell her?”
“Yes; I’m certain of it. She wouldn’t mind. She knows I never get into mischief. I feel perfectly free to do as I choose about this, and I don’t mean to mention you to any one—not because there would be any objection, but because you are too sacred to me, and if you let me be your friend, I can’t share that knowledge and possession with any one.”
Martha was determined to say this, but she did not accomplish it without a good deal of hesitation and embarrassment. Her companion looked at her with a sort of wondering scrutiny.
“Where do you get that earnest, concentrated nature, I wonder—so different from mine!” she said. “Does it go with the American character? Your words are very foolish, child; but it is so long since any one has held me sacred that I am ridiculously touched by it.”
There was something that looked like rising tears in the beautiful eyes of the princess; but a gay little laugh soon banished the shadow from both her face and her voice. Suddenly she sat upright and said:
“Suppose you come home with me now! I want you to learn the ways of the place, so that you may come and go as you please. Will you come with me there to-day?”
Martha agreed at once, and with evident satisfaction the princess leaned out of the window, and gave the address to the cabman.
III
Martha felt herself in a dream of delight as she descended from the cab, and, following the princess into the courtyard of a large apartment-house in the Rue Presbourg, mounted the stairs at her side.