Revelations.
At sight of Margot the Chieftain first beamed delight, and then screwed his chubby face into an expression of concern.
“Halloa! What’s up? You look pretty middling doleful!” cried he, casting an eloquent glance towards the inn windows, then lowering his voice to a stage whisper, “Macalisteritis, eh? Too much stuffy parlour and domestic reminiscences? Never mind! Pack clouds away, and welcome day! The sun is shining, and I have a packet of bull’s eyes for you in one pocket and a budget of letters in another. No, you don’t! Not one single one of them to read in the house—come and sit on a stone by the tarn, and we’ll suck peppermints and read ’em together. Wonderful how much better you’ll feel when you’ve had a good blow of fresh air. I was prancing mad when I went out this afternoon, but now—a child might play with me!”
He threw out his short arms with his favourite sweeping gesture, his coat flapped to and fro in the breeze, he stepped out with such a jaunty tread on his short broad feet, that at sight of him Margot’s depression vanished like smoke, and she trotted along by his side with willing footsteps.
“That’s better! That’s better! Never saw you look melancholy before, and never want to again... ‘Shocking disappearance of dimples! A young lady robbed of her treasures! Thief still at large! Consternation in the neighbourhood!’ Eh! How’s that? Young women who have been endowed with dimples should never indulge in low spirits. It’s a criminal offence against their neighbours. Where’s your brother?”
Margot laughed at the suddenness of the question. It was one of the Chieftain’s peculiarities to leap upon one like this, taking one unawares, and surprising thereby involuntary revelations.
“I don’t know,” she answered truthfully. “Over the hills and far away, I suppose—studying them in a new aspect. He loved them yesterday in the rain; to-day he felt sure that it would clear, and he wanted to see the mists rise. He does so intensely love studying Nature.”
“Humph?”
Margot looked at him sharply, her head involuntarily assuming a defensive tilt.
“What does ‘Humph’ mean, pray?”