"Where's Mr. Carleton?" said her cousin coming up one day.
"I don't know," said Fleda,--"I don't know but he is gone up into one of the tops."
"Your humble servant leaves you to yourself a great while this morning, it seems to me. He is growing very inattentive."
"I wouldn't permit it, Miss Fleda, if I were you," said Thorn maliciously. "You let him have his own way too much."
"I wish you wouldn't talk so, cousin Charlton!" said Fleda.
"But seriously," said Charlton, "I think you had better call him to account. He is very suspicious lately. I have observed him walking by himself and looking very glum indeed. I am afraid he has taken some fancy into his head that would not suit you. I advise you to enquire into it."
"I wouldn't give myself any concern about it!" said Thorn lightly, enjoying the child's confusion and his own fanciful style of backbiting,--"I'd let him go if he has a mind to, Miss Fleda. He's no such great catch. He's neither lord nor knight--nothing in the world but a private gentleman, with plenty of money I dare say, but you don't care for that;--and there's as good fish in the sea as ever came out of it. I don't think much of him!"
He is wonderfully better than you, thought Fleda as she looked in the young gentleman's face for a second, but she said nothing.
"Why, Fleda," said Charlton laughing, "it wouldn't be a killing affair, would it? How has this English admirer of yours got so far in your fancy?--praising your pretty eyes, eh?--Eh?" he repeated, as Fleda kept a dignified silence.
"No," said Fleda in displeasure,--"he never says such things."