Archie’s face brightened.
“Now you are better than sensible,” he said eagerly—“you are truly kind and charitable. And you are not mistaken. My aunt does mean to be kind, so far as she can understand it. A great many ugly things in this world come from ignorance, after all.”
“And from want of imagination,” said Blanche, thoughtfully. “Want of power to put one’s self in the place of another.”
She was beginning to think there was more in this young man, who had struck her at first as a mere boyish rattle; she was beginning to have a touch of the delightful suspicion that he was one who would “understand” her; and her face grew luminous, and her sweet eyes brighter, as she spoke.
He glanced at her again, with a smile in which there was no disappointment for her.
“Yes, I often think so; I have come to think so. But you are very young to have made such a discovery.”
Blanche could scarcely help laughing at his tone, she had so completely made up her mind that he was little, if any, older than she.
“Why,” she began, “I cannot be much—” But here she suddenly caught sight of Stasy’s face looking across at her with a sort of indignant appeal.
“Do come away, Blanchie,” it seemed to say.
“Something has rubbed her the wrong way,” thought Blanche, and she moved forward at once. “I think my sister wants me,” she said, with a little movement of the head, as if in farewell.