“Why not?” reflected Baron. He was drawing a picture of Bonnie May in his mother’s presence—his mother, who was the most punctilious of all elderly ladies, and whose genuine goodness of heart was usually quite concealed by the studied way in which she adhered to the unbending social codes that must govern a Baron—or, rather, a Boone. She was a Boone—of the Virginia Boones—when she married Baron’s father; a beauty who had been wealthy, despite the disintegration of the Boone fortunes when the Civil War freed the slaves.
He pictured Bonnie May in the dim old mansion that was his home—in that aged house that never knew the voices of children; in which even adults seemed always to be speaking in low, measured tones.
“The governess isn’t as bad as she would like to appear,” was his irreverent meditation, which still related to his mother. “And Flora would take my part. As for the governor——”
He turned to the child with decision. He realized, finally, that the question of treating her just as if she were any other lost child was not to be considered.
“Bonnie May,” he said, “I think you’d better go home with me for the time being. We can put something in the paper, you know, and I’ll find out if Miss Barry has left any word with the police. But that can’t be done in a minute, and of course we can’t sit here all afternoon. Come, let’s go home.”
The waitress came forward to assist when she saw Bonnie May trying to climb down from her chair without loss of dignity.
“It was very nice,” said the child, addressing the waitress. She was smiling angelically. “I think we’re ready,” she added, turning toward Baron.
She tried to catch step with him as they moved toward the door.
And Baron could not possibly have known that at that very moment his mother and his sister Flora were sitting in an upper room of the mansion, brooding upon the evil days that had fallen upon the family fortunes.