"What is it?" she said, calmly.
"I was thinking," he said, with some hesitation, "that if I could bribe Madame Potecki to leave her music-lessons—and take charge of you—and bring you to America—and you and she might live there until you are twenty-one—but I see it is impossible. It is too selfish. I should not have thought of it. What are two years, Natalie?"
The girl answered nothing; she was thinking deeply. When she next spoke, it was about Lord Evelyn, and of the probability of his crossing to the States, and remaining there for a year or two; and she wanted to know more about the
great country beyond the seas, and what was Philadelphia like.
Well, it was not to be expected that these two, so busy with their own affairs, were likely to notice much that was passing around them, as the forenoon sped rapidly away, and Natalie had to think of getting home again. But the little German maid servant was not so engrossed. She was letting her clear, observant blue eyes stray from the pretty young ladies riding in the Row to the people walking under the trees, and from them again to the banks of the Serpentine, where the dogs were barking at the ducks. In doing so she happened to look a little bit behind her; then suddenly she started, and said to herself, 'Herr Je!' But the little maid had her wits about her. She pretended to have seen nothing. Gradually, however, she lessened the distance between herself and her young mistress; then, when she was quite up to her, and walking abreast with her, she said, in a low, quick voice.
"Fraulein! Fraulein!"
"What is it, Anneli?"
George Brand was listening too. He wondered that the girl seemed so excited, and yet spoke low, and kept her eyes fixed on the ground.
"Ah, do not look round, Fraulein!" said she, in the same hurried way. "Do not look round! But it is the lady who gave you the locket. She is walking by the lake. She is watching you."
Natalie did not look round. She turned to her companion, and said, without any agitation whatever,