'Why, you have not been two minutes here, my dear child. And I wrote that I was better. It was only a cold. But at my age, "only a cold" may come to be a great deal, and I have got into the way of taking care of myself, I scarcely know why; it is natural, I suppose, and after all, however alone one is, life is a gift. We must not throw it away. I am not quite well yet'—she had coughed more than once while speaking—'but the weather is milder again.'
'Yes,' said Jacinth, 'a sort of St Martin's summer. I hope,' she added gently, 'you will let me wait upon you a little while I am here. Wouldn't you like the door shut?'
Lady Myrtle smiled. She liked the allusion to St Martin's summer; it seemed like a good omen. Was this bright young life, so strangely associated with her own youth, to bring back some spring-time to her winter?—was Jacinth to be a St Martin's summer to her?
'Thank you,' she said. 'Yes, please shut the outer door. Poor old Thornley often thinks he has closed it when he hasn't; his hands are so rheumatic. I like the door into the conservatory left open. Yes, that's right. And now come and talk to me for a few minutes before you take off your things. There is still half an hour to luncheon. Tell me what you have been doing these last few days—busy at lessons? That fair-haired little sister of yours doesn't look as if she overworked.'
Jacinth smiled.
'No,' she said, 'I don't think Francie overworks, but she does very well. The being at school has really been a good thing for her, for she feels herself that she is the better for emulation.'
'And the Scarletts are gentlewomen, thorough gentlewomen,' said Lady Myrtle, musingly. 'That makes a difference. And I suppose a good many of the pupils are really nice—lady-like and refined?'
'Yes,' said Jacinth, readily. 'The boarders are all nice—some of them really as nice in every way as they can be, clever, too, and anxious to learn. I don't seem to know them quite as well as Frances does, for, somehow, I am not very quick at making friends,' and she looked up at Lady Myrtle with a slight questioning in her eyes. The confession did not sound very amiable. But the old lady nodded reassuringly.
'Just as well or better that it should be so,' she said. 'Few friends and faithful has been my motto. Indeed, as for great friends I never had but one, and you know who that was, and I verily believe she never had any one as much to her as I was.' She sighed a little. 'Your sister is quite a child—a very nice child, I am sure, but she is not a Moreland at all. I have heard of some girls at Miss Scarlett's—let me see, who were they? What are the names of the ones you like best?'
Jacinth hesitated.