At sight of the blind man Nina started, and clasping her hands together, stood regarding him fixedly, while a look of perplexity deepened upon her face.
"Speak to her, Edith," whispered Arthur, but ere Edith could comply with his request, Nina's lips parted and she said, "YOU DID DO IT, DIDN'T YOU?"
"Whose voice was that?" and Richard started forward.
It's Nina, Mr. Harrington; pretty Nina Bernard; and Edith came to the rescue.
"She has a sweet, familiar voice," said Richard, "Come to me, little one, will you?"
He evidently thought her a child, for in her statement Edith had not mentioned her age, and Richard had somehow received the impression that she was very young. It suited Nina to be thus addressed, and she went readily to Richard, who pressed her soft, warm hands, and then telling her playfully that he wished to know how she looked, passed his own hand slowly over her face and hair, caressing the latter and twining one of the curls around his fingers; then, winding his arm about her slender waist, he asked how old she was.
"FIFTEEN YEARS AND A HALF," was her prompt reply.'
Richard never thought of doubting her word. She was very slight indeed. "A little morsel," he called her, and as neither Arthur nor Edith corrected the mistake, he was suffered to think of Nina Bernard as one, who, were she rational, would be a mere school- girl yet.
She puzzled him greatly, and more than once he started at some peculiar intonation of her voice.
"Little Snowdrop," he said, at last, "it seems to me I have known you all my life. Look at me, and say if we have met before?"