"Only don't you wear a sad face for anything!" Fleda went on earnestly; "we shall be perfectly happy if you and uncle Rolf only will be."
"My dear children!" said Mrs. Rossitur, wiping her eyes, "it is for you I am unhappy you and your uncle; I do not think of myself."
"And we do not think of ourselves, Mamma," said Hugh.
"I know it; but having good children don't make one care less about them," said Mrs. Rossitur, the tears fairly raining over her fingers.
Hugh pulled the fingers down and again tried the efficacy of his lips.
"And you know Papa thinks most of you, Mamma."
"Ah, your father!" said Mrs. Rossitur shaking her head; "I am afraid it will go hard with him! But I will be happy as long as I have you two, or else I should be a very wicked woman. It only grieves me to think of your education and prospects"
"Fleda's piano, Mamma!" said Hugh, with sudden dismay.
Mrs. Rossitur shook her head again and covered her eyes, while Fleda stretching across to Hugh, gave him, by look and touch, an earnest admonition to let that subject alone. And then, with a sweetness and gentleness like nothing but the breath of the south wind, she wooed her aunt to hope and resignation. Hugh held back, feeling or thinking that Fleda could do it better than he, and watching her progress, as Mrs. Rossitur took her hand from her face and smiled, at first mournfully, and then really mirthfully, in Fleda's face, at some sally that nobody but a nice observer would have seen was got up for the occasion; and it was hardly that, so completely had the child forgotten her own sorrow in ministering to that of another. "Blessed are the peacemakers!" It is always so.
"You are a witch or a fairy," said Mrs. Rossitur, catching her again in her arms "nothing else! You must try your powers of charming upon your uncle."