And again she kissed him.
“Mavis,” said Ruby, as the two little sisters were lying side by side in their white curtained beds, “cousin Hortensia may not know it, and nobody may know it, but I know it, and it is that years have passed since we went to bed here last night.”
“Yes,” said Mavis. “I think so too. There are some things that you can’t count time for, which are really far more than any time.”
“All my hating of Bertrand has gone away now,” continued Ruby. “Only I don’t want him to stay here, because the naughty in him and the naughty in me might get together again like it did before.”
“Why don’t you think of the good in him and the good in you joining to make you both better; and the good in me too! I suppose it isn’t conceited to think there is a little good in oneself, at least there’s trying to be and wanting to be,” said Mavis, with a little sigh. “But you’re so much quicker and cleverer than I am, Ruby, I wish you would think about helping me and not about being naughty. And, oh Ruby, isn’t it lovely to think that we may go sometimes to Forget-me-not Land?”
“Let’s go to sleep now as quick as we can and dream of it,” said Ruby.
Bertrand looked still very white and ill the next day. He was very quiet and subdued, and even gave in to Miss Hortensia’s decision that the doctor must be sent for. The doctor came “and shook his head.” The boy was not in a satisfactory condition,—which they knew already as it happened, otherwise the doctor would not have been sent for,—he had been shaken by the fall, and it was possible that his back had been injured. There was not much comfort in all this, certainly, but it decided one thing, that he was to stay where he was for the present, not to attempt to get up or to move about. And, strange to say, this too Bertrand accepted uncomplainingly.
He said no word to the doctor of the strange pain he had confided about to Mavis; and though his eyes seemed sad and wearied, they had a new look in them which had never been there before. Even Miss Hortensia was moved by it, though hitherto, and rightly, she had been inclined to treat Bertrand’s troubles as well deserved.
“Is there anything we can do for you, my poor boy?” she said kindly.
“No, thank you,” he replied; “except to let Mavis come to stay beside me sometimes—and—” he hesitated, “if the fisher-boy, Winfried, comes to the castle, I’d like to see him.”