“What, Sophy?”
“Well, that you are only our half-sister. You are only our half-sister, you know. We all think that, and perhaps you wouldn’t understand.”
To Rosalind’s heart this sting of mistrust went sharp and keen, notwithstanding the close strain of the little girl’s embrace which seemed to protest against the statement. “Is it really, really so?” she cried, in a voice of anguish. “Do you think I am not your real sister, you little ones? Have I done anything to make you think—”
“Oh, no, no! Oh, Rosalind, no! Oh, no, no!” cried the little girl, clasping closer and closer. The ghost, if it was a ghost, the “lady” who, Sophy was sure, was a “real lady,” disappeared in the more immediate pressure of this poignant question. Even Rosalind, who had now herself to be consoled, forgot, in the pang of personal suffering, to inquire further.
And they were still clinging together in excitement and tears when the door was opened briskly, and Uncle John, all brown and dusty and smiling, a day too soon, and much pleased with himself for being so, suddenly marched into the room. A more extraordinary change of sentiment could not be conceived. The feminine tears dried up in a moment, the whole aspect of affairs changed. He was so strong, so brown, so cordial, so pleased to see them, so full of cheerful questions, and the account of what he had done. “Left London only yesterday,” he said, “and here I am. What’s the matter with Amy? Crying! You must let her off, Rosalind, whatever the sin may be, for my sake.”
CHAPTER XLVII.
The arrival of John Trevanion made a great difference to the family group, which had become absorbed, as women are so apt to be, in the circle of little interests about them, and to think Johnny’s visions the most important things in the world. Uncle John would hear nothing at all of Johnny’s visions. “Pooh!” he said. Mrs. Lennox was half disposed to think him brutal and half to think him right. He scoffed at the fricassee of chicken and the cups of jelly. “He looks as well as possible,” said Uncle John. “Amy is a little shadow, but the boy is fat and flourishing,” and he laughed with an almost violent effusion of mirth at the idea of the suppressed gout. “Get them all off to some place among the hills, or, if it is too late for that, come home,” he said.
“But, John, my cure!” cried Mrs. Lennox; “you don’t know how rheumatic I have become. If it was not a little too late I should advise you to try it too; for, of course, we have gout in the family, whatever you may say, and it might save you an illness another time. Rosalind, was not Mr. Everard coming to lunch? I quite forgot him in the pleasure of seeing your uncle. Perhaps we ought to have waited, but, then, John, coming off his journey, wanted his luncheon; and I dare say Mr. Everard will not mind. He is always so obliging. He would not mind going without his luncheon altogether to serve a friend.”
“Who is Mr. Everard?” said John Trevanion. He was pleased to meet them all, and indisposed to find fault with anything. Why should he go without his lunch?
“Oh, he is very nice,” said Aunt Sophy somewhat evasively; “he is here for his ‘cure,’ like all the rest. Surely I wrote to you, or some one wrote to you, about the accident with the boat, and how the children’s lives were saved? Well, this is the gentleman. He has been a great deal with us ever since. He is quite young, but I think he looks younger than he is, and he has very nice manners,” Mrs. Lennox continued, with a dim sense, which began to grow upon her, that explanations were wanted, and a conciliatory fulness of detail. “It is very kind of him making himself so useful as he does. I ask him quite freely to do anything for me; and, of course, being a young person, it is more cheerful for Rosalind.”