A strange smile passed over Mildred's face. 'Are you sure she will regard it in that light, Dr. Heriot?'
'What do you think?' he returned, eagerly. 'It is there I want your advice. I am not disinterested. I fear my own selfishness, my hearth is so lonely. Think how this young girl, with her sweet looks and words, will brighten it. Dare I venture it? Is Polly to be won?'
'She is too young to have formed another attachment,' mused Mildred. 'As far as I know, she is absolutely free; but I cannot tell, it is not always easy to read girls.' A fleeting thought of Roy, and a probable childish entanglement, passed through Mildred's mind as she spoke, but the next moment it was dismissed as absurd. They were on excellent terms, it was true, but Polly's frank, sisterly affection was too openly expressed to excite suspicion, while Roy's flirtations were known to be legion. A perfectly bewildering number of Christian names were carefully entered in Polly's pocket-book, annotated by Roy himself. Polly was cognisant of all his love affairs, and alternately coaxed and scolded him out of his secrets.
'And you think she could be induced to care for her old guardian?' asked Dr. Heriot, and there was no mistaking the real anxiety of his tone.
'Why do you call yourself old?' returned Mildred, almost brusquely. 'If Polly be fond of you, she will not find fault with your years. Most men do not call themselves old at eight-and-thirty.'
'But I have not led the life of most men,' was the sorrowful reply. 'Sometimes I fear a bright young girl will be no mate for my sadness.'
'It has not turned you into a misanthrope; you must not be discouraged, Dr. Heriot; trouble has made you faint-hearted. The best of your life lies before you, you may be sure of that.'
'You know how to comfort, Miss Lambert. You lull fears to sleep so sweetly that they never wake again. You will wish me success, then?'
'Yes, I will wish you success,' she returned, with a strange melancholy in her voice. Was it for her to tell him that he was deceiving himself; that benevolence and fancy were painting for him a future that could never be verified?
He would take this young girl into the shelter of his honest heart, but would he satisfy her, would he satisfy himself?