Mona Part 25

"You have had trouble--you have lost friends," Miss Kitty remarked, glancing at her black dress.

"Yes--all that I had in the world," Mona returned, with a quivering lip and a sigh that was almost a sob; for the sweet girl's kindly interest moved her deeply.

"I am sorry," said her companion, simply, but sincerely. Then she continued, with heartiness: "But let me count myself your friend after this--will you? I think you are very nice, and I believe it would be very easy to love you--you poor, lonely child!" and before Mona realized her intention, she had stooped and kissed her softly on the cheek.

She did not give her any opportunity to reply, but tripped away, flus.h.i.+ng over her own impulsive familiarity.

She looked back over her shoulder as she reached the door and added:

"Good-by, Miss Richards; remember, you and I are to be friends; and thank you ever so much for mending my dress."

She was gone before Mona could answer, even to tell her that she was very welcome, but her heart warmed toward the bright, genial maiden, and she stood listening, with a smile on her lips, to the sound of her little feet pattering down the stairs, and the next moment she caught her merry laugh as some one swung her lightly into her saddle.

Then Mona went down to the library, where she selected a book, and then, finding the room empty, she decided to remain where she was for a while.

Rolling a great easy-chair into a deep bay-window, she nestled, with a feeling of pleasure, in its cozy depths, and was soon deeply absorbed in the contents of her book.

She must have been reading half an hour when a slight sound in another portion of the room startled her. Turning to see what had caused it, she saw Louis Hamblin standing between the parted portieres of an archway, and gazing upon her, a smile of triumph on his handsome face.

Mona sprang from her chair, looking the surprise she felt, for she did not suppose he was in the house.

"Do not rise, Miss Richards," said the young man, as he came forward. "It is really a great pleasure to find you here, but I pray that you will not allow me to disturb you."

"I thought you had gone with the party," the young girl said, hardly knowing how to reply to him, but deeply annoyed by his presence.

"No; I had a raging toothache all night, so had to make up my rest this morning and have but just eaten breakfast. But sit down, Miss Richards; everybody has gone off and left me behind; I am lonely, and nothing would suit me better than a social little chat with yourself," he concluded, with obnoxious familiarity.

Mona drew her graceful form to its full height, while her red lips curled scornfully.

"Thank you, but it might be considered in bad taste for one in Mr.

Hamblin's position to be found chatting socially with his aunt's seamstress, whom he is not supposed to know," she said, a note of sarcasm in her tone.

The young man laughed out lightly.

"Ah! you resent it because I did not recognize you the day we came to Hazeldean," he returned; "but you will forgive me, I know, when I tell you that I avoided betraying the fact of our previous acquaintance simply for your own good. I feared it might make you conspicuous if I saluted you, as I wished to do, and my aunt is very particular about the proprieties of life."

Mona smiled proudly. She failed to perceive how a courteous recognition could have made her conspicuous or violated in any way the most rigid laws of etiquette.

"In that case we will continue to observe the proprieties of life upon all occasions," she dryly remarked.

He read her thoughts, and was keenly stung by her words.

"Forgive me," he said, with an a.s.sumption of regret and humility, thinking thus the better to gain his end; "had I realized that you would have been so wounded I should have acted very differently. I a.s.sure you I will never offend you in the same way again."

"Pray do not be troubled," Mona coldly retorted. "I had no thought of resenting anything which you might consider proper to do. If I thought of the matter at all, it was only in connection with the generally accepted principles of courtesy and good-breeding."

Mr. Hamblin flushed hotly at this keen shaft, but he ignored it, and changed the subject.

"I am sorry to have interrupted you in your reading, Miss Richards. What have you that is interesting?"

"Victor Hugo's 'Les Miserables,'" Mona briefly replied.

"Have you?" the young man eagerly demanded, "I was searching for that book only yesterday. May I look at it one moment? McArthur and I had quite a discussion upon a point regarding Father Madelaine, and we were unable to settle it because we could not find the book."

Mona quietly pa.s.sed the volume to him; but a blank look overspread his face as he took it.

"Why, it is the original!" he exclaimed, "and I do not read French readily. Are you familiar with it?"

"Oh, yes," and Mona smiled slightly.

She had been accounted the finest French scholar in her cla.s.s.

Mr. Hamblin regarded her wonderingly.

"Where did you learn French to be able to read it at sight?" he inquired.

"At school."

"But--I thought--" he began, and stopped confused.

"You thought that a common seamstress must necessarily be ignorant, as well as poor," Mona supplemented: "that she would not be likely to have opportunities or ambition for self-improvement. Well, Mr. Hamblin, perhaps some girls in such a position would not, but I honestly believe that there is many a poor girl, who has had to make her own way in life, who is better educated than many of the so-called society belles of to-day."

"I believe it, too, if you are a specimen," her companion returned, as he gazed admiringly into Mona's flushed and animated face.

"At any rate," he added, "you are far more beautiful than the majority of society girls."

"Mr. Hamblin will please reserve his compliments for ears more eager for and more accustomed to them," Mona retorted, with a frown of annoyance.

"Why are you so proud and scornful toward me, Miss Richards?" he appealingly asked. "Can you not see that my admiration for you is genuine--that I really desire to be your friend? And why have you avoided me so persistently of late--why have you rejected my flowers?"

"Because," Mona frankly answered, and meeting his glance squarely, "I know, and _you_ know, that it is not proper for you to offer, nor for me to accept, such attentions, even if I desired them."

"I am my own master; you are your own mistress, if, as you say, you are alone in the world; consequently, such a matter lies between ourselves, without regard to what others might consider as 'proper,' And I may as well make an open confession first as last," he went on, eagerly, and bending nearer to her, with a flushed face. "Ruth, my beautiful Ruth, I love you--I began to love you that morning when we met on the steps before our own door, and every day has only increased my affection for you."

A startled look swept over Mona's face, which had now grown very pale.

She had not had a suspicion that she was destined to hear such a declaration as this; it had taken her wholly unawares, and for a moment she was speechless.

But she soon recovered herself.

"Stop!" she haughtily cried "you have no right to use such language to me; you would not presume--you would not _dare_ to do so upon so brief an acquaintance, if I stood upon an equal footing with you, socially. It is only because I am poor and unprotected--because you simply wish to amuse yourself for a time. You would not dare to repeat in the presence of Mrs.

Montague what you have just said to me. Now let me pa.s.s, if you please, and never presume to address me again as you have to-day."

The indignant girl looked like some beautiful princess as she stood before him and thus resented the insult he had offered her.

Her slight form was held proudly erect, her small head was uplifted with an air of scorn, her eyes blazed forth angry contempt as they met his, while her whole bearing indicated a conscious superiority which both humiliated and stung her would-be suitor.

She had never appeared so beautiful to him before. Her face was as pure as a pearl; her glossy hair, falling loosely away from her white forehead, was simply coiled at the back of her small head, thus revealing its symmetrical proportions to the best advantages. Her great brown eyes glowed and scintillated, her nostrils dilated, her lips quivered with outraged pride and delicacy.