The "blue boy," as she mentally called him, came dancing out of the wood, throwing up his cap, and singing as he came. At sight of Margaret he paused, in some confusion, cap in hand.
"I—I beg your pardon," he said. "I trust I did not disturb you with my carol? There isn't generally any one here, you know; I get rather to feel as if it all belonged to me. I hope the little chap is all right to-day, Miss—Is it Miss Montfort?"
"Oh, yes! Certainly!" said Margaret, blushing in her turn. "I ought to have said, of course—yes, thank you, Mr. Merryweather, Merton is quite well to-day; and I really think he has had a lesson, for he has not run away since, and it is two or three days ago. I—my uncle has been suddenly called away on business, but he asked me to say—that is, we shall be very glad to see you at the house any day; Miss Montfort, his cousin,—my uncle's cousin,—is there with me and the children."
"Thanks awfully," murmured Gerald. "I'd like to come ever so much, some day; but I keep all in a mess so—" he glanced down ruefully at his blue clothes, and finding them quite respectably clean, brightened visibly. "My father was at school with Mr. Montfort; Miles Merryweather, perhaps he told you, Miss Montfort?"
"Yes, he told me. I—I always think Uncle John must have been such a delightful boy. I am sure they must have had good times together."
"So was the Pater, no end; I mean, my father was an agreeable youth also." Gerald stopped short, and glanced sidelong at the young girl. He was well used to girls, having sisters and cousins; but they were used to him, too, and he somehow felt that this sweet, serious-looking maiden was not accustomed to young men, and that he must, as he silently put it to himself, "consider the prudent P, and the quaintly quiggling Q."
"And Uncle John must have been a brilliant scholar!" Margaret went on, warming to her subject. She had never, as it happened, walked and talked with a lad before in her quiet life; she did not know quite how to do it, but so long as she talked about Uncle John, she could not go wrong. "He knows so much,—so much that he must have learned early, because it is so a part of him. Wasn't he head of his class most of the time? He never will talk about it, but I am sure he must have been."
"I am not so sure about that," Gerald admitted; "I know he was the best wrestler, and that he and my father were generally neck and neck in all the running races. He was a better high kick, because his legs were longer, don't you know, but the Pater was ahead in boxing."
Margaret was bewildered. Was this scholarship? Was this the record that brilliant boys left behind them? She gave a little sigh; the mention of long legs brought her back to Basil again. Dear Basil! he had only one pair of knickerbockers left that was fit to be seen. She ought to be mending the corduroys this moment, in case he should come home all in pieces, as he was apt to do.
"Have you any little brothers, Mr. Merryweather?" she asked, following the thread of her thought.