Villette

on.
    »Polly,« I interrupted, »should you like to travel?«
    »Not just yet,« was the prudent answer; »but perhaps in twenty years, when I am grown a woman, as tall as Mrs. Bretton, I may travel with Graham. We intend going to Switzerland, and climbing Mount Blanck; and some day we shall sail over to South America, and walk to the top of Kim – kim – borazo.«
    »But how would you like to travel now, if your papa was with you?«
    Her reply – not given till after a pause – evinced one of those unexpected turns of temper peculiar to her: –
    »Where is the good of talking in that silly way?« said she. »Why do you mention papa? What is papa to you? I was just beginning to be happy, and not think about him so much; and there it will be all to do over again!«
    Her lip trembled. I hastened to disclose the fact of a letter having been received, and to mention the directions given that she and Harriet should immediately rejoin this dear papa. »Now, Polly, are you not glad?« I added.
    She made no answer. She dropped her book, and ceased to rock her doll; she gazed at me with gravity and earnestness.
    »Shall you not like to go to papa?«
    »Of course,« she said at last in that trenchant manner she usually employed in speaking to me; and which was quite different from that she used with Mrs. Bretton, and different again from the one dedicated to Graham. I wished to ascertain more of what she thought; but no: she would converse no more. Hastening to Mrs. Bretton, she questioned her, and received the confirmation of my news. The weight and importance of these tidings kept her perfectly serious the whole day. In the evening, at the moment Graham's entrance was heard below, I found her at my side. She began to arrange a locket-ribbon about my neck, she displaced and replaced the comb in my hair; while thus busied, Graham entered.
    »Tell him by-and-by,« she whispered; »tell him I am going.«
    In the course of tea-time I made the desired communication. Graham, it chanced, was at that time greatly preoccupied about some school-prize, for which he was competing. The news had to be told twice before it took proper hold of his attention; and even then he dwelt on it but momently.
    »Polly going? What a pity! Dear little Mousie, I shall be sorry to lose her: she must come to us again, mama.«
    And hastily swallowing his tea, he took a candle and a small table to himself and his books, and was soon buried in study.
    »Little Mousie« crept to his side, and lay down on the carpet at his feet, her face to the floor; mute and motionless she kept that post and position till bed-time. Once I saw Graham – wholly unconscious of her proximity – push her with his restless foot. She receded an inch or two. A minute after one little hand stole out from beneath her face, to which it had been pressed, and softly caressed the heedless foot. When summoned by her nurse she rose and departed very obediently, having bid us all a subdued good-night.
    I will not say that I dreaded going to-bed, an hour later; yet I certainly went with an unquiet anticipation that I should find that child in no peaceful sleep. The forewarning of my instinct was but fulfilled, when I discovered her, all cold and vigilant, perched like a white bird on the outside of the bed. I scarcely knew how to accost her; she was not to be managed like another child. She, however, accosted me. As I closed the door, and put the light on the dressing-table, she turned to me with these words: –
    »I cannot –
cannot
sleep; and in this way I cannot –
cannot
live!«
    I asked what ailed her.
    »Dedful miz-er-y!« said she, with her piteous lisp. »Shall I call Mrs. Bretton?«
    »That is downright silly,« was her impatient reply; and, indeed, I well knew that if she had heard Mrs. Bretton's foot approach, she would have nestled quiet as a mouse under the bedclothes. While lavishing her eccentricities regardlessly before me – for whom she professed scarcely the semblance of affection – she never showed my godmother one glimpse of her inner self: for her, she was nothing but a docile, somewhat quaint little maiden. I examined her; her cheek was crimson; her dilated eye was both troubled and glowing, and painfully restless: in this state it was obvious she must not be left till morning. I guessed how the case stood.
    »Would you like to bid Graham good-night again?« I asked. »He is not gone to his room yet.«
    She at once stretched out her little arms to be