Then these two girls became more confidential, and Joyce gave her cousin every particular respecting the work she had undertaken, the manner in which she had obtained the situation, and of the fact that Mrs. Caruth was sending her own maid to accompany her on her journey to Springfield Park.
"It seems quite amusing to think that one who is travelling with such an object should be so attended, does it not?" asked Joyce.
Adelaide looked thoughtful, then replied, "Mrs. Caruth must think a great deal about you. Does she understand what you are going to do?"
"I am not sure, but I do know she is my friend. She was almost like a mother to me until I was about seventeen, and when I had none of my own. Then—"
"Then what?"
"Her son came home for a time, and she had him, and I became more of a companion to my father."
"I believe I have seen both Mrs. Caruth and her son. Does she call him Alec?"
"Always. He is about thirty-two now. You see I was only nine when he was twenty, and as the child of his old tutor, he made a pet and playfellow of me. It seems strange that we should both be grown-up people after a few years."
"He is very fond of his mother, and she of him," said Adelaide. "Indeed, he seems a good, noble-minded man altogether. Augusta thought there was no one like him during the eight weeks we spent at Mentone."
A statement which did not appear to give unqualified satisfaction to Joyce, for she paused a moment, then, in a constrained voice, though with an attempt at archness, she asked—