Rose, saying this, knew in her heart she could not stay away if she tried. Next morning she was there, and the next, and the next, and the next. Then came a week of wild, snowy weather, when the roads were heaped high, going out was an impossibility, and she had to stay at home. Rose chafed desperately under the restraint, and grew so irritable that it was quite a risk to speak to her. All her old high spirits were gone. Her ceaseless flow of talk suddenly checked. She wandered about the house aimlessly, purposelessly, listlessly, sighing wearily, and watching the flying snow and hopeless sky. A week of this weather, and January was at its close before a change for the better came. Rose was falling a prey to green and yellow melancholy, and perplexing the whole household by the unaccountable alteration in her. With the first gleam of fine weather she was off. Her long morning rides were recommenced; smiles and roses returned to her face, and Rose was herself again.
It took that sprained ankle a very long time to get well. Three weeks had passed since that January day when Regina had slipped on the ice, and still Mr. Reinecourt was disabled; at least he was when Rose was there. He had dropped the Miss Danton and taken to calling her Rose, of late; but when she was gone, it was really surprising how well he could walk, and without the aid of a stick. Old Jacques grinned knowingly. The poetry reading and the long, long talks went on every day, and Rose's heart was hopelessly and forever gone. She knew nothing more of Mr. Reinecourt than that he was Mr. Reinecourt; still, she hardly cared to know. She was in love, and an idiot; to-day sufficed for her—to-morrow might take care of itself.
"Rose, chérie," Mr. Reinecourt said to her one day, "you vindicate your sex; you are free from the vice of curiosity. You ask no questions, and, except my name, you know nothing of me."
"Well, Mr. Reinecourt, whose fault is that?"
"Do you want to know?"
Rose looked at him, then away. Somehow of late she had grown strangely shy.
"If you like to tell me."
"My humble little Rose! Yes, I will tell you. I must leave here soon; a sprained ankle won't last forever, do our best."
She looked at him in sudden alarm, her bright bloom fading out. He had taken one of her little hands, and her fingers closed involuntarily over his.
"Going away!" she repeated. "Going away!"