'But—but if you leave me—oh, you must not leave me, Heriot,' returned the girl, with sudden inexplicable emotion; 'what shall I do without you?'
'Have I grown so necessary to you all at once?' he returned, and there was an accent of reproach in his voice. 'Nay, Polly, this is not like your sensible little self; you know I must go back to my patients.'
'Yes, I know; but all the same I cannot bear to let you go; promise me that you will come back soon—very soon—before Roy gets much better.'
'I will not leave you longer than I can help,' he replied, earnestly, distressed at her evident pain at losing him, but steadfast in his purpose to leave her unfettered by his presence. 'Now, sweet one, you must not detain me any longer, as to-night I am Roy's nurse,' and with that she let him leave her.
There was a bright fire in the room where Mildred and she were to sleep. When Mrs. Madison had lighted the tall candle-sticks on the mantelpiece, and left her to finish her unpacking, Polly tried to amuse herself by imagining what Olive would think of it all.
It was a long, low room, with a corner cut off. All the rooms at The Hollies were low and oddly shaped, but the great four-post bed, with the moreen hangings, half filled it.
As far as curiosities went, it might have resembled either the upper half of a pawnbroker's window, or a mediæval corner in some shop in Wardour Street—such a medley of odds and ends were never found in one room. A great, black, carved wardrobe, which Roy was much given to rave about in his letters home, occupied one side; two or three spindle-legged and much dilapidated chairs, dating from Queen Anne's time, with an oaken chest, filled up all available space; but wardrobe, mantelpiece, and even washstand, served as receptacles for the more ornamental objects.
Peacocks' feathers and an Indian canoe were suspended over the dim little oblong glass. Underneath, a Japanese idol smiled fiendishly; the five senses, and sundry china shepherdesses, danced round him like wood-nymphs round a satyr; a teapot, a hunting-watch, and an emu's egg garnished the toilet-table; over which hung a sampler, worked by Mrs. Madison's grandmother; two little girls in wide sashes, with a long-eared dog, simpered in wool-work; a portrait of some Madison deceased, in a short-waisted tartan satin, and a velvet hat and feathers, hung over them.
The face attracted Polly in spite of the grotesque dress and ridiculous headgear—the feathers would have enriched a hearse; under the funeral plumes smiled a face still young and pleasant—it gave one the impression of a fresh healthy nature; the ruddy cheeks and buxom arms, with plenty of soft muscle, would have become a dairymaid.
'I wonder,' mused the girl, with a sort of sorrowful humour, 'who this Clarice was—Mrs. Madison's grandmother or great-grandmother most likely, for of course she married—that broad, smiling face could not belong to an old maid; she was some squire or farmer's wife most likely, and he bought her that hat in London when they went up to see the Green Parks, and St. James's, and Greenwich Hospital, and Vauxhall,—she had a double chin, and got dreadfully stout, I know, before she was forty. And I wonder,' she continued, with unconscious pathos, 'if this Clarice liked the squire, or farmer, or whatever he may be, as I like Heriot. Or if, when she was young, she had an adopted brother who gave her pain; she looks as though she never knew what it was to be unhappy or sorry about anything.'