So when it was first whispered, and then exclaimed, that Professor May had left nothing, absolutely nothing, for his daughter but a very small life-insurance premium and the furniture of their rented house, with a little old-fashioned jewelry and silverware of the smallest possible intrinsic value, Miss Christina called upon Miss May and told her that, if she would accept it, there was a vacancy in the academy, with a salary of two hundred dollars a year and board, but not lodging.
"And if you remain with me, my dear, as I hope you will, I can give you a room next year, after the new wing is added; and, meanwhile, I know of a vacant room, at two dollars a week, in a highly-respectable lodging-house."
"You are very kind," replied Rosamond, in a quivering voice. "But indeed I am afraid I don't know enough to teach even the very little girls. So I'm afraid you'd better get somebody else. Don't you think you had?"
"No," said Miss Christina, patting the useless little hand which lay on her lap. "You will only be obliged to hear spelling- and reading-lessons, and teach the class of little girls who have not gone beyond the first four rules of arithmetic, and perhaps you will help them to play on their holidays: you could impart an element of refinement to their recreations more readily than an older teacher could."
"Is that all?" exclaimed Rosamond, almost cheerfully. "Oh, I can easily do that much. I love little girls. I will be so good to all the homesick ones. When shall I come?"
"As soon as you can, my dear," replied Miss Christina.
In a few weeks Rosamond had settled into the routine of her new life,—going every morning to the academy, where she spent the day in hearing lessons, binding up broken hearts, playing heartily with her scholars in the intermissions, and being idolized by them in each of her various capacities. She did not forget her father, but it was impossible for her sweet and childlike nature to remain in mourning long.
Professor Silex had felt a profound pity for his old friend's daughter, and had come down out of the clouds long enough to express it in scholarly terms and to offer any assistance in his power. They met sometimes on the stairs and in the dreary parlor, and his eyes beamed with such a friendly light upon her over the top of his spectacles that she began to tell him her small troubles and to ask his advice in a manner which sometimes completely took his breath away. He had never had a sister, his mother died before his remembrance, and he had been brought up by two elderly aunts. Fancy, then, his consternation when he was suddenly and beseechingly asked, "Oh, Professor Silex, would you get a little felt bonnet, if you were me, or one of those lovely wide-brimmed beaver hats? The hats are a dollar more; but they are so lovely and so becoming!"
"My dear child," stammered the professor, "have you no female friend with whom you can consult? I am profoundly ignorant. Miss Eldridge—"
"She says to get the felt," pouted the dear child; "just because it's cheaper. And papa used always to advise me, when I asked him, to get what I liked best." The blue eyes filled, as they still did at the mention of her father.