Jasper looked down rather scornfully at the small girl, who, in a rich and elaborately embroidered dressing-gown, was kneeling by the fire. Evelyn’s handsome eyes, the only really good feature she possessed, were fixed full upon her maid’s face.
“The Castle is too stiff for me,” she said, “and too—too airified and high and mighty. Mother was quite right when she spoke of Castle Wynford. I don’t care for anybody in the place except Uncle Ned. I don’t know how I shall live here. Oh Jasper, don’t you remember the evenings at home? Cannot you recall that night when Whitefoot was ill, and you and mothery and I had to sit up all through the long hours nursing her, and how we thought the dear old moo-cow would die! Don’t you remember the mulled cider and the gingerbread and the doughnuts and the apple-rings? How we toasted the apple-rings by the fire, and how they spluttered, and how good the hot cider was? And don’t you remember how mothery sang, and how you and I caught each other’s hands and danced, and dear old Whitefoot looked up at us with her big, sorrowful eyes? It is true that she died in the morning, but we had a jolly night. We’ll never have such times any more. Oh, I do wish my own mothery had not died and gone to heaven! Oh, I do wish it—I do!”
Evelyn crossed her arms tightly on her breast and began to sway herself backwards and forwards. Tears streamed from her eyes; she did not attempt to wipe them away.
“Now then, it is my turn to speak,” said Jasper. “I tell you what it is, Eve; you are about the biggest goose that was ever born in this world. Who would compare that stupid, rough old ranch with this lovely, magnificent house? And it is your own, Eve—or rather it will be your own. I took a good stare at the Squire, and I do not believe he will live to be very old; and whenever he dies you are to take possession—you and I together, Eve love—and out will go her ladyship, and out will go proud Miss Audrey. That will be a fine day, darling—a day worth living for.”
“Yes,” said Evelyn slowly; “and then we’ll alter things. We’ll make the Castle something like the ranch. We’ll get over some of our friends, and they shall live in the house. Mr. and Mrs. Petrie, who keep the egg-farm not a mile from the ranch, and Mr. Thomas Longchamp and Pete and Dick and Tom and Michael. I told them all when I was going away that when I was mistress of the Castle they should come, and we’ll go on much as we went on at the ranch. If mothery up in heaven can see me she will be glad. But, Jasper, why do you speak in that scornful way of my cousin Audrey? I think she is very beautiful. I think she is quite the most beautiful girl I have ever looked at. As to her being stately, she cannot help being stately. I wish I could walk like her, and talk like her, and speak like her; I do, Jasper—I do really.”
“Let me see,” said Jasper in a contemplative tone. “You are learning to love her, ain’t you?”
“I don’t love easily. I love my own darling mothery, who is not dead at all, for she is in heaven with father; and I love you, Jasper, and my uncle Edward.”
“My word! and why him?”
“I cannot help it; I love him already, and I’ll love him more and more the longer I see him and the more I know him. My father must have been like that—a gentleman—a perfect gentleman. Oh! I was happy at the ranch, and mothery was like no one else on the wide earth, but it gave me a sort of quiver down my spine when Uncle Edward took my hand, and when he kissed me. He is like what father was. Had father lived I’d have spent all my days here, and I’d have been perhaps quite as graceful as Audrey, and nearly as beautiful.”
“You will never be like her, so you need not think it. You are squat like your mother, and you ain’t got a decent feature in your face except your eyes, and even they are only big, not dark; and your hair is skimpy and your face white. You are a sort of mix’um-gather’um—a sort of betwixt-and-between—neither very fair nor very dark, neither very short nor very tall. You are thick-set, just the very image of your mother, and you will always be thick-set and always mix’um-gather’um as long as you live. There! I have spoken. I ain’t going to be afraid of you. You had better get into bed now, for it is late. You want your beauty-sleep, and you won’t get it unless you are quick. Now march! Put on your night-dress and step into bed.”