'No, it is not, and she knows it,' returned the girl, excitedly; 'ask her, Heriot; look at her; that is not the reason she will not suffer me to go to Roy.'
Mildred turned her burning face bravely on the two.
'Whatever reasons I have, Polly knows me well enough to respect them,' she said, with dignity; 'it is far better for Roy that his aunt or his sister should be with him. Polly ought to know that her place is beside you.'
'Aunt Milly, how dare you speak so,' cried the girl, hotly, 'as though Roy were not my own—own brother. Have we not cared for each other ever since I came here a lonely stranger; do you think he will get better if he is fretting, and knows why you have left me behind; when he was ill in the summer, would he have any one to wait on him but me?'
'Oh, Polly,' began Mildred, sorrowfully, for the girl's petulance and obstinacy were new to her; but Dr. Heriot stopped her.
'Let the child speak,' he said, quietly; 'she has never been perverse to you before; she has something on her mind, or she would not talk so.'
The kind voice, the unexpected sympathy, touched Polly's sore heart; and as he held out his hand to her, she crept out of her dark corner. He drew her gently to his side.
'Now, Polly, what is it? there is something here that I do not understand—out with it like a brave lassie.'
But she hung her head.
'Not now, not here, before the others,' she whispered, and with that he rose from his seat, but he still kept hold of her hand.