"O no!" said Fleda smiling.
"Then your grandfather teaches you at home?"
"No,"--said Fleda,--"father used to teach me,--grandpa doesn't teach me much."
"What do you do with yourself all day long?"
"O plenty of things," said Fleda, smiling again. "I read, and talk to grandpa, and go riding, and do a great many things."
"Has your home always been here, Fairy?" said Mr. Carleton after a few minutes' pause.
Fleda said "No sir," and there stopped; and then seeming to think that politeness called upon her to say more, she added,
"I have lived with grandpa ever since father left me here when he was going away among the Indians,--I used to be always with him before."
"And how long ago is that?"
"It is--four years, sir;--more, I believe. He was sick when he came back, and we never went away from Queechy again."