'I have only learned it—if I have learned it—from your father,' replied Mrs Harper. 'At your age I was dreadfully impetuous and hasty. I often wonder, dear child, how you can be so thoughtful and helpful as you are.'
Camilla's eyes sparkled with pleasure.
'Mother,' she said, 'we mustn't degenerate into a mutual admiration society. I shall tell father how we've been buttering each other up all breakfast-time. It will amuse him. I'm going to see if he will have some more tea.'
And she ran off.
By mid-day Captain Harper was established on his sofa in the little drawing-room, which his wife and daughters still strove so very hard to keep fresh and pretty. From this sofa, alas! especially now that winter was in the ascendant even at sheltered Southcliff, the invalid was but seldom able to move. For walking had become exceedingly painful and difficult, and so slow that even a little fresh air at the best part of the day could only be procured at the risk of chill and cold—a risk great and dangerous. And barely six months ago the tap of his crutch had been one of the most familiar sounds in the little town; he had been able to walk two or three miles with perfect ease and the hearty enjoyment which his happy nature seemed to find under all circumstances. It had not proved untrue to itself even now. There was a smile on his somewhat worn face—a smile that was seen in the eyes too, as real smiles should always be—as his daughter came into the room to see that he had everything he wanted about him.
'It is really getting colder at last, father,' she said. 'At Thetford, Bessie writes, they have had some snow. And Margaret was delighted because it made her think of Christmas, and Christmas means coming home.'
'Poor old Mag!' said Captain Harper. 'Mag' was his own special name for his youngest daughter; and no one else was allowed to use it. 'Poor old Mag! I really think she's very happy at school, though—don't you, Camilla? Bessie, I knew, would be all right, but I had my misgivings about Mag. And it is in every way such a splendid chance for them. It would be'——And he hesitated.
'What, father?'
'Such a pity to break it up,' he said, 'as—we have almost come to think must be done.'
'They would be perfectly miserable to stay there, if they understood—as indeed they do now,' Camilla replied, 'that it would be only at the cost of what you must have, father dear.'