“He feels awfully, Aunt Anne.”
“That will do no harm, Dick.” The boy turned again to the drosera and his lens.
Anne was herself so entirely brave that not even the prospect of the coming of added pain had ever been able to make her timid. All forms of courage were to her intelligibly beautiful, knowing as she did that if its mere instinctive form be meaningless, it is, in its higher developments, the knightly defense of all the virtues. She pulled Dick’s ear, playfully, and said, finally:
“Jack will be out at noon. The less you say about it, the better.”
“I guess so,” remarked Dick.
“Ah, here comes Mr. Carington. Now, boys, behave yourselves at breakfast. No nonsense, mind! This is to be a very pretty-behaved family; we will make up for it at lunch.”
The two gentlemen were in turn presented. There were the ordinary greetings, and no word of allusion to the day before, except that Mrs. Lyndsay, in a quiet aside, said to Carington:
“I shall not be quite comfortable until I say how much I thank you—for all of us—all.”
“That is more than enough,” he returned. “How is Miss Lyndsay?”
“Wonderfully well!” And presently they went in to breakfast.