“Are you sure of that?” Meg asked quietly.
“Of course I’m sure,” was the impatient answer.
“Very well. I’ll see that no one has reason to criticise my actions again. Thank you for telling me. Good-night,” she said gently, as she started to her room.
“_Pray, goody, please to moderate the rancour of your tongue._”
Meg did not see Robert for a week after that memorable walk. The days of his absence were not sweetened by the comments of her aunt. “I knew he would grow tired of being pursued. Men are not won that way,” was the remark, with variations, which greeted the girl every day of the seven during which she did not have the saving grace of Robert’s presence to help her endure the torture.
All that was broad and sweet in her nature rejected the imprecations, but what there was of suspicion, engendered by the loveless home life she had led, listened to her tormentor.
It was not surprising, therefore, that she became irritable and nervous. It was in this mood that Robert found her, when, after his week of battle, he again walked up the narrow, flower-bordered path. It seemed to him that he had never really been there before. Just as Meg, after the great revelation, had appeared in a new light, so now did her surroundings.
There was a certain tender gravity in his face as he offered her his hand, which she purposely ignored. He flushed at this, but being familiar with her somewhat prickly disposition, saw nothing significant in her refusal to shake hands with him. “How is Aunt Amelia?” he asked idly, as he seated himself.
“As ravishingly disagreeable as usual, thank you,” was the somewhat snappy retort.
“Has your supply of kerosene oil run out? You don’t seem to have been lighting the piano-lamp lately, with the music-box accompaniment.”
She almost smiled, but thought better of it, and replied, “My ambition in that line has been nearly killed for lack of encouragement. Candles and a jew’s-harp are about as near as I can approach to my shaded lights and soft music.”
After a pause she said: “I’m sorry she’s not here just now. It will grieve her to learn that she has missed a gentleman caller. They are not standing in line any longer, so she can’t afford to lose one.”
Meg ignored his remark, and kept on: “She heard this morning of a new skin balm, and she has torn madly down town to procure it. She will be in rare good-humor when she returns. She always is after buying something to enhance her beauty.”