But, even while I spoke, there flitted across my brain a faint foreshadowing of a time when the memory of that dim little room would become painfully dear. The feeling passed as quickly as it came, and I drew the folds of Ronald's wrapper over his mouth to guard him from the chilly wind of spring. Then the cab came up to the door, and we stood at the window to watch the disposal of our luggage on the roof.
"The guitar will go inside," said I to the servant.
So the guitar was carried out in its case and deposited on the front seat, and Ronald followed, so slowly and feebly that my heart ached to see him. I was the last to get in; and so we turned our backs upon that dreary house where we had suffered the sharpest sorrow that we had ever yet known.
The drive to our new abode was not a long one; and as it was fated that we were to meet with a disaster, it was well that it did not come upon us until we were very near our home. As we turned sharply out of Welbeck Street another cab came smashing into ours, and we were overturned in a moment. Assistance was soon forthcoming; the two drivers exchanged compliments after the manner of their kind; ready helpers collected our boxes, and placed us, quite unharmed, in another vehicle; in short, it was one of those "marvellous escapes" of which one hears so much, and there was only one thing belonging to us which was much the worse for the accident.
And that one thing was Ronald's guitar.
Until I was fairly inside our new rooms, I did not realise that the poor guitar was completely done for, and then I confess I shed some very bitter tears. Our new landlady (who had been a dear old nurse of mine) was much amazed and scandalised by my excessive grief, and instantly fell to reproving me as she had done in the days of my childhood.
"I'm astonished at you, Miss Louie," said she, forgetting my matronly dignity. "If your husband's bones had been smashed, you couldn't have made a greater fuss, and all about a musical instrument of no account whatever! A pianner, now, would be worth crying over, but there never was much noise to be got out of that poor silly stringed thing."
I am quick of temper, and I felt very much inclined to slap nurse at that moment.
"Go away," I said, crying anew. "You never can understand how dear that guitar is to me. I first f-f-fell in love with Ronald when he was playing upon it."
"What a fool I be!" soliloquised nurse, smiling. "I might have known as much. Why, I remember that I took a fancy to my old man when he was blowing his flute; and yet most folks say that a flute's dreadfully disfiguring to the countenance."