I took Rhoda Polly's hand, and put it into the gloved fingers of the little Princess.
"Not to me, dear Alida," I said, "but to this girl; she has, as you shall find, a heart of gold."
Alida kept the strong roughened fingers in hers, and looked deep into the eyes of Rhoda Polly as if to read her inmost soul.
"I shall remember that, Angoos," she said; "that is a beautiful thing when it is said in the language of my own country. It sings itself—it makes poetry. Listen!
"'Rhoda Polly of the Golden Heart—Heart of Gold, how true is my maiden!' Wait, I will sing it for you in Arabic——"
But suddenly, no one knew why, the female heart being many stringed and unaccountable, even to me, Rhoda Polly was crying—yes, Rhoda Polly the dry-eyed, and who but Alida was comforting her under the stupid gaze of hangers-on about the station of Aramon!
CHAPTER XXIII
THE MISGIVINGS OF ALIDA
At the house in the garden the new servants stood ready, neat and smiling. My father had written to a Protestant pastor at Grenoble to send him two maids of his religion. Accordingly two sisters had arrived, Claire and Hermance Tessier, reliable pleasant-faced girls with no family ties in Aramon and with the difference of religion to keep them apart from indiscriminate gossipry. The wing of the house where they were to sleep had formed a part of the wall, possibly even it may have been an ancient gateway in the time of the Montmorencies. My father had joined it to the main building by a flying bridge of iron roofed with zinc—which was Dennis Deventer's own private contribution to Garden Cottage. I had warned him of the nocturnal habits of Linn and her husband, and he agreed with me that while for Alida's sake they must be served according to the French fashion, they need not be deprived of the nightly freedom of their own house which was their greatest luxury.