“And you think he would do it for me?” said he with an odd smile. “You are too young—much too young. If I had my way, you should remain a happy child for years and years yet—no millinery, no balls, no admiration, for seven years at least. Ah! when I think of your mother, and see you looking at me with her happy eyes! But what is the use of going over all this? I shall, be late for church, and I must bid you good day. And if I shall see—what is this you call her, little one?—Prickly Polly!—I shall send her wool-gathering, shall I? And then you can pass the day without her.”
They all laughed.
“Oh! I am not the least afraid of her; though I am not very big,” said Frederica.
“But you may send her to gather wool, all the same,” said Theresa.
Then they went quietly on their way. There was no dancing along the street after that, as Mr St. Cyr saw when he turned at the corner of the square to look after them.
“She is like her mother,” said he to himself, “but more like her grandmother, that shrewd little Jewess, with her ‘good sense,’ as madame the schoolmistress says. Ah! if she had lived, that poor foolish child would not have been suffered to make that great mistake in life. But I must go to church. How many times have I said that I would not permit myself to care for her children as I have cared for her, to have my heart torn by ingratitude, or by indifference, which is as ill to bear. If, indeed, through them I could wound the self-love and vanity of their father, and so avenge the wrongs of my friend’s child, the poor Theresa—ah! then I might care for them, and fight for them against him to the death.” And with this Christian sentiment in his heart, the little man went up the great cathedral steps to pray.
In the meantime the two girls were walking slowly down the street.
“I like Cousin Cyprien very much,” said Frederica, gravely.
“Yes, so do I,” said her sister. “But then he is not our cousin, you know.”
“Well, he was grandpapa’s cousin; and if he is not ours, we have none. I like him.”