A Little Rebel | Page 5

insubordination of one pin to leave her without it again.
The professor is looking pale, but has on him all the air of one prepared for anything as the maid shows him into the drawing-room of the house where Miss Jane Majendie lives.
His thoughts are still full of her niece. Her niece, poor woman, and his ward--poor man! when the door opens and some one comes in.
Some one!
The professor gets slowly on to his feet, and stares at the advancing apparition. Is it child or woman, this fair vision? A hard question to answer! It is quite easy to read, however, that "some one" is very lovely!
"It is you; Mr. Curzon, is it not?" says the vision.
Her voice is sweet and clear, a little petulant perhaps, but still very sweet. She is quite small--a little girl--and clad in deep mourning. There is something pathetic about the dense black surrounding such a radiant face, and such a childish figure. Her eyes are fixed on the professor, and there is evident anxiety in their hazel depths; her soft lips are parted; she seems hesitating as if not knowing whether she shall smile or sigh. She has raised both her hands as if unconsciously, and is holding them clasped against her breast. The pretty fingers are covered with costly rings. Altogether she makes a picture--this little girl, with her brilliant eyes, and mutinous mouth, and soft black clinging gown. Dainty-sweet she looks,
"Sweet as is the bramble-flower."
"Yes," says the professor, in a hesitating way, as if by no means certain of the fact. He is so vague about it, indeed, that "some one's" dark eyes take a mischievous gleam.
"Are you sure?" says she, and looks up at him suddenly, a little sideways perhaps, as if half frightened, and gives way to a naughty sort of little laugh. It rings through the room, this laugh, and has the effect of frightening her altogether this time. She checks herself, and looks first down at the carpet with the big roses on it, where one little foot is wriggling in a rather nervous way, and then up again at the professor, as if to see if he is thinking bad things of her. She sighs softly.
"Have you come to see me or Aunt Jane?" asks she; "because Aunt Jane is out--I'm glad to say"--this last pianissimo.
"To see you," says the professor absently. He is thinking! He has taken her hand, and held it, and dropped it again, all in a state of high bewilderment.
Is this the big, strong, noisy girl of his imaginings? The bouncing creature with untidy hair, and her clothes pitchforked on to her?
"Well--I hoped so," says she, a little wistfully as it seems to him, every trace of late sauciness now gone, and with it the sudden shyness. After many days the professor grows accustomed to these sudden transitions that are so puzzling yet so enchanting, these rapid, inconsequent, but always lovely changes
"From grave to gay, from lively to severe."
"Won't you sit down?" says his small hostess gently, touching a chair near her with her slim fingers.
"Thank you," says the professor, and then stops short.
"You are----"
"Your ward," says she, ever so gently still, yet emphatically. It is plain that she is now on her very best behavior. She smiles up at him in a very encouraging way. "And you are my guardian, aren't you?"
"Yes," says the professor, without enthusiasm. He has seated himself, not on the chair she has pointed out to him, but on a very distant lounge. He is conscious of a feeling of growing terror. This lovely child has created it, yet why, or how? Was ever guardian mastered by a ward before? A desire to escape is filling him, but he has got to do his duty to his dead friend, and this is part of it.
He has retired to the far-off lounge with a view to doing it as distantly as possible, but even this poor subterfuge fails him. Miss Wynter, picking up a milking-stool, advances leisurely towards him, and seating herself upon it just in front of him, crosses her hands over her knees and looks expectantly up at him with a charming smile.
"Now we can have a good talk," says she.
CHAPTER III.
"And if you dreamed how a friend's smile And nearness soothe a heart that's sore, You might be moved to stay awhile Before my door."
"About?" begins the professor, and stammers, and ceases.
"Everything," says she, with a little nod. "It is impossible to talk to Aunt Jane. She doesn't talk, she only argues, and always wrongly. But you are different. I can see that. Now tell me,"--she leans even more forward and looks intently at the professor, her pretty brows wrinkled as if with extreme and troublous thought--"What are the duties of a guardian?"
"Eh?" says the professor. He