“You really must, my dear boy,” she protested, when Mr. Douane seemed inclined to plead a previous engagement. “I never had the pleasure of knowing your father, but he was my dear husband’s favorite cousin, and best friend, and I feel it a great honor to welcome his son to my home.”
Mrs. Marsh spoke with so much feeling that her voice trembled, and Gretel thought she must have loved Mr. Marsh very dearly, but then she remembered that she was never “Gretel darling” except before company, and reflected that perhaps it was the same way about other people as well. She was “Gretel darling” and “dearest Gretel” all that evening, and once when she was passing Mrs. Marsh, that lady suddenly put an arm round her, and gave her a kiss, which was such an unusual demonstration of affection that the little girl fairly gasped with astonishment. Ada was not so affectionate, but she talked and laughed a great deal and seemed to like Mr. Douane very much indeed. She asked if she might call him Cousin Percy, and seemed so delighted to have him at home that Gretel was rather puzzled, for Ada had once told her that she had not seen Percy Douane since she was a little girl, and scarcely remembered him at all.
But all these things made but a trifling impression on Gretel, for her whole attention was absorbed by her brother. The more she looked at him, the handsomer she thought him, and every time he spoke to her, her heart began to beat so fast that she could scarcely answer him.
“I am sorry to say Gretel is very shy,” Mrs. Marsh remarked to the visitor on one of these occasions. “We are doing all we can to give her more confidence in herself, but I am afraid the life with her father was rather bad for her. Her training was sadly neglected.”
Gretel felt the hot, indignant color rush up into her cheeks, but she dared not contradict Mrs. Marsh. She ventured a timid glance at her brother, and the expression she saw in his eyes reassured her.
“My stepfather may not have been a disciplinarian,” he said, gravely, “but he was one of the kindest and most generous men I have ever known.”
“I am sure it is very noble of you to speak so beautifully of him,” Mrs. Marsh murmured, and then the subject was changed.
Mr. Douane was not a great talker, but all that he said was interesting. Ada asked a great many questions about life in China, and Mrs. Marsh appeared very anxious to find out why her cousin had come so unexpectedly.
“I dare say it is only a flying visit,” she said, smiling, “and that you will be off to the ends of the earth again before we have had time to realize we have had a glimpse of you.”
“I am not so sure of that,” said Mr. Douane. “I may decide to settle down for a while. I had a bad attack of typhoid in the autumn, and since then I have had a sort of longing for my own country. A fellow begins to think about home and friends when he is too weak to turn over in bed without assistance.”