"Is he clever?"
"I think he is. He has a more or less original turn of mind. He read me some of his verses the other day."
"Poor you!" laughed Maryllia.
"Well, I was inclined to pity myself when he first began"--said Walden, laughing also--"But I must confess I was agreeably surprised. Some of his fancies are quite charming."
They had been walking slowly across the lawn, and were now within a few steps of the big cedar-tree.
"I must take you into the rose-garden, Mr. Walden!"--and she raised her eyes to his with that childlike confiding look which was one of her special charms,--"The roses are just budding out, and I want you to see them before the summer gets more advanced. Though I daresay you know every rosebush in the place, don't you?"
"I believe I do!" he admitted--"You see an old fogey like myself is bound to have hobbies, and my particular hobby is gardening. I love flowers, and I go everywhere I can, or may, to see them and watch their growth. So that for years I have visited your rose-garden, Miss Vancourt! I have been a regular and persistent trespasser,--but all the same, I have never plucked a rose."
"Well, I wish you had!" said Maryllia, feeling somewhat impatient with him for calling himself an 'old fogey,'--why did he give himself away?--she thought,--"I wish you had plucked them all and handed them round in baskets to the villagers, especially to the old and sick persons. It would have been much better than to have had them sold at Riversford through Oliver Leach."
"Did he sell them?" exclaimed John, quickly--"I am not surprised!"
"He sold everything, and put the money in his own pocket"--said Maryllia,--"But, after all, the loss is quite my own fault. I ought to have enquired into the management of the property myself. And I certainly ought not to have stayed away from home so many years. But it's never too late to mend!" She smiled, and advancing a step or two called "Cicely!"
Cicely turned, looking up from beneath her spreading canopy of dark cedar boughs.
"Oh, Maryllia, we're having such fun!" she exclaimed--"Mr. Adderley is talking words, and I'm talking music! We'll show you how it goes presently!"
"Do, please!" laughed Maryllia; "It must be delightful! Mr. Walden and I are going into the rose-garden. We shall be back in a few minutes!"