"You are very good," said Sir Peter, slowly, looking down. "Donald has but few pleasures, poor fellow!"
After this, all the talk died out of the little baronet, and he soon rose and left the room.
"Indeed!" cried Gertrude, as the door closed on her step-father, "Donald has tormented us ever since to know when you were coming to see him. You had better take Colonel Wilton to the school-room, Helen, and have done with it."
"I am quite ashamed of troubling you, Colonel Wilton," said Lady Fergusson. "But that boy's whims are very absurd, and Sir Peter is very weak, I must say."
"However, we have had quite a respite since little Miss Rivers came down," interrupted Helen Saville. "She manages him wonderfully. You cannot think what a curious pair they are together. You have seen Donald; and Miss Rivers, though not absolutely plain, is a cold, colorless little thing, generally very silent."
"But she can tell stories delightfully," cried Isabella; "she makes Donald laugh and be quite good-humored for hours together."
"I fear," interrupted the accomplished Miss Walker, "that, if my young charge is too much with Master Fergusson and his companion, her mind will be quite occupied with a very useless array of fairy tales and legends, more calculated to distort than to illustrate historic truth."
"I am sure you are right, Miss Walker. Isabella, you must not go into Donald's room without Miss Walker's permission," remarked Lady Fergusson.
"And she will never let me," said Isabella, with a very rebellious pout.