“Of course he makes himself useful and agreeable—more agreeable than any person I ever saw. I have only known him a day or two, and yet I like him better than anybody in the world except Margery.”
“Phil ought to feel complimented with your opinion which, I assure you, is well merited,” Mr. Beresford said, while a horrid feeling of jealousy took possession of him.
Why would girls always prefer an indolent, easy-going, good-for-nothing chap like Phil Rossiter, to an active, energetic, throughgoing man like himself? Not that he had heretofore been troubled by what the girls preferred, for he cared nothing for them in the abstract; but this restless, sparkling French girl was different, and he felt every nerve in his body thrill with a strange feeling of ecstasy when at parting she laid her, soft warm hand on his, and looking up at him with her bright, earnest eyes, said to him:
“Now you will write at once to Messrs. Polignie and inquire about Christine; and I shall write, too; for I must find her and bring her here to live with me. Grandma says I ought to have somebody—some middle-aged, respectable woman, as a kind of guardian—but, ugh! I hate guardians!”
“Oh, I hope not!” Mr. Beresford said, laughingly, managing to retain the hand laid in his so naturally. “In one sense I am your guardian, and I hope you don’t hate me.”
“Certainly not,” Reinette said. “I think you are very nice. You are father’s friend, and he said I must like you, and tell you everything, and I do like you ever so much, though not the way I do Phil. I like him because he’s so good and funny, and my cousin, and—well, because he is Phil.”
“Happy Phil! I wish I was good and funny, and your cousin!” Mr. Beresford said, as he bade her good-afternoon and rode away.
“I hope he is not falling in love with me, for that would be dreadful. I wouldn’t marry him any sooner than I would Phil. He is too old, and dignified, and poky,” Reinette thought, as she watched him going down the hill, while he was mentally registering a vow to enter the lists and compete with the young man who was so much liked because he was Phil.
CHAPTER XIX.
THE LITTLE LADY OF HETHERTON.
