Meg laughed as she answered, “I hope I know the value of silence.”
Just then Meg’s quick eyes detected a little bird which had been wantonly shot, and was lying under the tree where probably it had made its home. Picking it up, she murmured a few broken words of pity, which might have been a requiem over the little dead body.
“Isn’t it cruel?” she asked, raising her lovely dark-lashed eyes to Mrs. Malloy’s face, “and so useless,—a little bird that never harmed anyone,—and not even good to eat,” she added mournfully.
Mrs. Malloy was impelled to laugh, though she, too, felt the pity of it.
They finally sat down under a large tree, whose branches afforded a refreshing shade. Leaning her back against the tree, and sighing restfully, Mrs. Malloy turned to look at her companion. Meg wore the most inexpensive white dress, but she wore it as she did all of her home-made clothes, like a small princess.
As she sat there, with her hands clasped around her knees, and her small head, with its refractory reddish hair, drooping, there was a pathetic look about her that went straight to Mrs. Malloy’s warm heart. She put her hand out and slightly touching Meg’s shoulder, said softly: “You look unhappy, dear,—sort of lonely. Can I help you?”
The girl’s face changed instantly, and looking up at Mrs. Malloy she said gayly, “But I’m not lonely,—not now.”
Mrs. Malloy withdrew her hand and said simply, “Pardon me. I no doubt seemed intrusive.”
“You intrusive! oh, dear Mrs. Malloy, you couldn’t be intrusive! Why, if you should tell me my hair was red, I would not be offended. And that’s what I wouldn’t take from anyone else,” she added under her breath.
“Well, I won’t be so rude, nor so untruthful. It is beautiful auburn, a color I’ve always liked.”