“I wish I had never given my sanction to this plan; there is something behind the scenes. Harriet brave; Harriet noble? I never yet was mistaken in a face,” was his thought. “Well, little Ralph, you have to prove it to my satisfaction, that is one comfort.” That day the little party landed at Lymington and went for a time into the New Forest under the shade of the “Immemorial Elms.” Ralph and Harriet had time to be alone for a short period. It was rather difficult now for the boy and the girl to be unobserved on these occasions. It seemed to Harriet that the eyes of all the school-mothers watched them, that Robina, in particular, followed them about with those grey eyes of hers.
Robina was true to her word. She tried to enjoy herself and was great friends with all her companions with the exception of Jane, whom she left to Harriet entirely, and with the exception of Ralph, whom, from a motive which she could not define, she left more or less to himself. This very fact distressed Mr Durrant not a little. Now, Robina and the Amberley girls were all walking under the trees, chatting and talking, and Harriet and Ralph found themselves alone.
“I has done it,” said Ralph. “I spoke to father and telled him that I wished him to choose you.”
“Oh, you did, did you?” said Harriet. She pulled Ralph’s little hand through her arm. “You will never be sorry for that, I can tell you, Ralph. I mean to give you a beautiful time when I am your school-mother.”
“Oh, yes,” said Ralph; “but ’tisn’t ’cause of the beautiful time that you’re to be my school-mother, is it, Harriet?”
Harriet looked puzzled.
“I mean,” said Ralph, “that I is going to be a big boy. Next birthday I’ll be six, then seven, then eight—I’ll be growed up in no time. When a person is growed up, then a person hasn’t to think only just of nice things. I telled father that I wanted you to be my school-mother, to stay with me all the time, ’cause you’re so brave and so noble.”
“You told him that?” said Harriet, with a short laugh: “nothing more, I hope?”
“No, nothing more, ’cause you wouldn’t let me. But, Harriet,” he said, “father did—”
“What, dear?”