"I will see," he said rising, "whether some other service cannot be had more satisfactory than that of fairies!"
"Now Charlton," said Fleda with a sudden change of manner, coming to him and laying her hand most gently on his arm,--"please don't speak about these things before uncle Rolf or your mother--Please do not!--Charlton!--It would only do a great deal of harm and do no good."
She looked up in his face, but he would not meet her pleading eye, and shook off her hand.
"I don't need to be instructed how to speak to my father and mother; and I am not one of the household that has submitted itself to your direction."
Fleda sat down on her bench and was quiet, but with a lip that trembled a little and eyes that let fall one or two witnesses against him. Charlton did not see them, and he knew better than to meet Hugh's look of reproach. But for all that there was a certain consciousness that hung about the neck of his purpose and kept it down in spite of him; and it was not till breakfast was half over that his ill-humour could make head against this gentle thwarting and cast it off. For so long the meal was excessively dull. Hugh and Fleda had their own thoughts; Charlton was biting his resolution into every slice of bread and butter that occupied him; and Mr. Rossitur's face looked like anything but encouraging an inquiry into his affairs. Since his son's arrival he had been most uncommonly gloomy; and Mrs. Rossitur's face was never in sunshine when his was in shade.
"You'll have a warm day of it at the mill, Hugh," said Fleda, by way of saying something to break the dismal monotony of knives and forks.
"Does that mill make much?" suddenly inquired Charlton.
"It has made a new bridge to the brook, literally," said Fleda gayly; "for it has sawn out the boards; and you know you mustn't speak evil of what carries you over the water."
"Does that mill pay for the working?" said Charlton, turning with the dryest disregard from her interference and addressing himself determinately to his father.
"What do you mean? It does not work gratuitously," answered Mr. Rossitur, with at least equal dryness.