“That you are,—in short, that you are—a thief.”
The man was still laughing at this uncompromising reply, when the door of the apartment opened, and a little girl entered. She was very young, but there was such ease, grace, and high breeding in her air, that she seemed older than she really was.
As she advanced into the room, she gazed with a quiet wonder at the two strange figures there; but, looking more intently at the man,—whose coarse, rude garments at first prevented her recognizing him,—she sprang forward, and threw herself into his arms, exclaiming, “Father! dear father!”
He embraced her fondly in return, and for a few moments they were wholly engrossed with each other. Presently, he turned to where Paulina stood in mute astonishment at this scene, and said: “But I must not forget my little preserver. Thank her, Hermione. I owe her my life. She helped me out of that confounded wood, where I might have wandered on till now—or perished, starving of cold and hunger. She saved me from the snow sleep, in which I might have been frozen to death. She guided me through all these mortal dangers, to say nothing of her keeping guard upon my morals.”
He was laughing heartily as he concluded, but Paulina never altered from the serious look with which she regarded him. She kept her eyes steadily upon his face, with the grave scrutiny with which from time to time she had observed him, ever since she had had doubts of his being the poor destitute creature he had seemed at first.
“Well, little one, have you made up your mind yet about me?” he said.
“I have heard of robbers going out prowling in poor shabby clothes, and having a rich home, with plenty of luxuries to come to,” she said in her straightforward way; “so you may still be what I took you for,—a thief. But somehow I don’t think you are, now.”
“And pray what may have altered your opinion?” said he.
“Your daughter,” she replied. “Since I have seen her, I think you must be an honest man,—an honorable man, a gentleman,—for all you are meanly dressed. Perhaps that may have been from some chance—some accident, and that you are, in fact, some great lord.”