Mr. Underwood, who did not believe in taking what he called the "women
folks" into his confidence regarding business affairs, looked
quizzically into the laughing face beside him.
"Didn't I hear you arranging some sort of a musical programme with Mr.
Darrell?" he inquired.
"Yes; what has that to do with your engagement?" she queried.
"Nothing whatever; only you carry out your engagement and I will mine,
and we'll compare notes afterwards."
For an instant her face sobered; then catching sight of her father's
eyes twinkling under their beetling brows, she laughingly withdrew from
his side, saying,-"That's all very well; you can score one this time, papa, but don't you
think we won't come out pretty near even in the end!"
Upon learning from Darrell that the violin she expected him to use was
in his room at the mining camp, she then proposed a stroll to the summit
of the pine-clad mountain for the following afternoon, and having
secured his promise that he would bring the violin with him on his next
visit, she waltzed gayly across the floor, turned on the light, and
seating herself at the piano soon had the room ringing with music and
laughter while she sang a number of college songs.
To Darrell she seemed more child than woman, and he was constantly
impressed with her unlikeness to her father or aunt. She seemed to have
absolutely none of their self-repression. Warm-hearted, sympathetic, and
demonstrative, every shade of feeling betrayed itself in her sensitive,
mobile face and in the brown eyes, one moment pensive and wistful, the
next luminous with sympathy or dancing with merriment.
As Darrell took leave of Mrs. Dean that night, he said, looking frankly
into her calm, kindly face,-"I am very sorry if I wounded your feelings this afternoon; it was
wholly unintentional, I assure you."
"You did not in the least," she answered; "it is so long since I have
been called by that name it took me by surprise, but it sounded very
pleasant to me. My boy, if he had lived, would have been just about your
age."
"It seemed pleasant to me to call you 'mother,'" said Darrell; "it made
me feel less like an outsider."
"You can call me so as often as you wish; you are no outsider here; we
consider you one of ourselves," she responded, with more warmth in her
tones than he had ever heard before.
The following morning Darrell accompanied the ladies to church. After
lunch he lounged for an hour or more in one of the hammocks on the
veranda, listening alternately to Mr. Underwood's comments as he
leisurely smoked his pipe, and to the faint tones of a mandolin coming
from some remote part of the house. Mr. Underwood grew more and more
abstracted, the mandolin ceased, and Darrell, soothed by his
surroundings to a temporary forgetfulness of his troubles, swung gently
back and forth in a sort of dreamy content. After a while, Kate
Underwood appeared, dressed for a walk, and, accompanied by Duke, the
two set forth for their mountain ramble, for the time as light-hearted
as two children.