She looked at him admiringly. Their eyes met almost at a level and the eyes were very like.
“I’m afraid that is so! And you are Zelda—our little Zee!”
“Quite that! We must be acquainted! Perhaps we shall be friends, who knows? Aunt Julia promised to arrange it,—and I’m not used to being disappointed.”
Zelda was a name that had been adopted in the Merriam family long ago, though no one knew exactly how. Now and then some one sought in the Bible for light on the significance of the name and sought in vain; but there always remained for such the consoling reflection that Zelda sounded like the Old Testament anyhow. Zelda Dameron’s grandmother Merriam, for whom she was named, had always been called Zee. There had been something abrupt and inadvertent about Mrs. Merriam that the single syllable seemed to express. A great many people had never known that old Roger Merriam’s wife’s name was Zelda, so generally was Zee applied to her even in her old age. And in like manner the same abbreviation was well adapted to the definition and description of her granddaughter. Margaret Dameron’s child had been called Little Zee while her grandmother lived, and until her aunt had taken her away; and now, on her reappearance in Mariona, she was quite naturally spoken of as Zee Dameron, which seemed appropriate and adequate.
Her voice was unusually deep, but it was clear and sweet. She was very dark, like themselves, as Mrs. Forrest had said. There was a wistfulness in the girl’s eyes that touched Rodney Merriam by the suggestion of her dead mother, the sister that had been the pride of the Merriams. Mrs. Forrest watched her brother curiously. She had speculated much about this meeting, and had planned it for her own house. But her brother had been away from town on her arrival a week before. Rodney Merriam was away from home a great deal; his comings and goings were always unexpected. He had reached Mariona at noon from a trip into Canada, and had gone to Mrs. Carr’s in pursuit of his sister. Mrs. Forrest understood perfectly that her brother had come to Mrs. Carr’s tea chiefly that he might casually, and without apparent interest, inspect his niece. He was a Merriam, and the Merriams did things differently, as every one in Mariona knew. Rodney Merriam was wary of entanglements with his relatives; he had broken with most of them, and he did not intend to be bored by any new ones if he could help it. He and Mrs. Forrest were, it was said in Mariona, the only Merriams who could safely be asked to the same table, or who were not likely to cause embarrassment if they met anywhere. He had not spoken to Ezra Dameron, Zelda’s father, for ten years, and the name Dameron was an offense in his nostrils; but the girl was clearly a Merriam; she was the child of his favorite sister, and he hoped it would be possible to like her.
“Yes, we shall be friends—much more than friends,” he said kindly.
“You must come and see me; Aunt Julia has graduated me, and I’m back on my native heath to stay. I shall come to see you. I used to like your house very much, Uncle Rodney. It’s a trifle austere, as I remember, but we can change all that.”
There was a subdued mirth in her that pleased him; it had been a conclusion of his later years that young girls lacked spirit and humor; they were dull and formal, and talked inanely to old people. Zelda promised better things, and he was relieved.
“Come and tell me what you have learned in distant lands,—and I’ll tell you what to forget! I’m not sure that your Aunt Julia has been a safe preceptress. And as you’re going to live in Mariona I must, as the saying is, ‘put you on’.”
“That isn’t right. You should say, ‘put you next,’—a young American told me so in Paris.”