For a moment she stood regarding him just as he was studying her; then, forgetting everything in her joy at seeing him again, she went forward to meet him, and giving him both her hands, while a beautiful flush dyed her cheeks, said to him:
“I am so glad you have come back; it was so lonesome here, and I was just thinking about you.”
Her greeting was so much more cordial than Everard had expected that it made him very happy, and he kept her hands in his until she drew them away with a sudden wrench, and stepping back from him, put on the dignity she had for a moment dropped. But the action became her and her long dress, and Everard looked closely and admiringly at her, puzzled to know just what it was which had changed her so much. He guessed that she was thinking of that scene in his father’s room, but he meant to ignore it altogether, and, if possible, put her on her old familiar footing with himself; so, looking at her from head to foot, he said:
“What is it, Rossie? What have you done to yourself? Pieced down your gown, or what, that you seem so much taller and grander every way,—quite like Bee, in fact? Yes, you have got on a train, sure as guns, and your hair up in a comb; that part I don’t like; the other change is rather becoming, but I’d rather see you so;” and playfully pulling the comb from her head, he let the wavy hair fall in masses upon her neck and shoulders. “There, that’s better; it gives me little Rossie again, and I do not wish to lose my sister.”
He was trying to reassure her, and she knew it, and was very grateful to him for the kindness, and said, laughingly, that she put up her hair because she thought it suited the long dresses which she meant to wear now that she was a woman of business, but if he liked it in her neck it should be worn so; and then she asked him of his journey, and if he was not tired and hungry.
“Tired? No; but cold as a frog and hungry as a bear. What have we for dinner?” And he turned to inspect the little round table laid for one. “Nothing but toast and tea. Why, that would starve a cat. Did you dine in the middle of the day?”
Rosamond colored painfully as she answered:
“I had lunch, as usual. I was not hungry. I am never hungry now, and just have tea at night.”
“Rossie,” and Everard laid both hands on her shoulders and looked her squarely in her eyes, “Rossie, are you practicing economy, so as not to use the money you think belongs to me?”
He divined her motive, for it was the fear of using the Forrest money needlessly which was beginning to rule her life, and had prompted her to omit the usual dinner, the most expensive meal of the day, and have, instead, plain bread and butter, or toast and tea; and Everard read the truth in her tell-tale face, and said: