Suddenly she said: “I’m no good at all; you may think I am, but I’m not.”
“Aren’t you?” murmured Hillary, somewhat taken aback.
“You’re a clever girl. Not many girls can quote the poets and rattle off verses as you can. I suppose your father’s an educated kind of man and has a good library?” he added after a pause.
Gabrielle’s hearty peal of laughter at the idea of her father possessing a library made the frightened parrots flutter in a wheel-like procession over the belt of shoreward mangroves. Then she said: “Well, my father has got a lot of books, but they really belonged to a ship’s captain—a nice old man who lived with us years ago, when I was a child.” Then she added: “His ship was blown ashore here in a typhoon and when he went away he left all his books behind him in Dad’s bungalow. I’ve learned almost all I know from those books.” Saying this, she pointed with her finger towards the shore, and said: “From the top of that hill you can see the old captain’s ship to-day: it’s a big wreck with three masts. Father told me that the old captain often got sentimental and went up on the hills to stare through a telescope at his old ship lying on the reefs.”
“How romantic! So I’ve to thank the old captain that you can quote the works of the poets to me,” said Hillary. Then he added: “But still, you’re a clever girl, there’s no doubt about it.”
“I’m secretly wicked, down in the very depths of me.”
“No! Surely not!” gasped the apprentice as he stared at the girl.
Then he smiled and said quickly: “What you’ve just said is proof enough that you’re not wicked. You’re imaginative, and so you imagine that you have limitations that no one else has. If anyone’s wicked it’s me, I know,” he added, laughing quietly.
“I’ve got the limitations right enough, that’s why I feel so strange and miserable at times.”
“Don’t feel miserable, please don’t,” said Hillary softly as he blessed the silence of the primitive spot and the opportunity that had arisen for his direct sympathy.