Margaret Maliphant

								

said she. "Your face is a nice sight."
I flushed angrily. I think it was enough to make any girl angry.
It was bad enough to know that I was disfigured by a scratch on my
cheek without having a stranger's attention attracted to it, and
running a risk besides of a scolding from mother, who came in at the
moment. Luckily she did not hear what Deborah had said. She was too
much engaged in welcoming her guest, which she did with that gentle
dignity that to some might have looked like a want of cordiality, but
to me seems, as I look back upon it, to be just what a welcome should
be--hospitable without being anxious. But when we were seated at the
supper-table she noticed the mark on my face.
"It's only a fall that I got on the marsh," said I, in answer to her
inquiry. "It isn't of the slightest consequence."
She said no more, neither did Mr. Harrod. I must say I was grateful to
him. He saw that I wished the matter to be forgotten, and he respected
my desire; but I have often wondered since, what construction he
put upon my behavior. If he thought about me at all, he must have
considered me a somewhat extraordinary example of a young lady, but I
do not suppose that he did consider me at all. Of course I was nothing
but a figure to him; he had plenty to do feeling his level in the new
life upon which he had just entered.
I am sure that Mr. Harrod was a very shy and a very proud man. When
mother said that she should expect him every evening to sup at the
Grange, he refused her invitation with what I thought scant gratitude,
although the words he used were civil enough; and when father spoke
of his friendship with the squire, he said that he was beholden to
the squire for his recommendation, but that he should never consider
himself a friend of a man who was in a different station of life to
himself.
I think in my heart I admired him for this sentiment, and father should
also have approved of it; but if I remember rightly, mother made
some quiet rejoinder to the effect that it was not always the people
who were on one's own level that were really one's best friends. I
recollect that she, who was wont generally to sit and listen, worked
hard that evening to keep up the conversation.
Dear mother! whom with the arrogance of youth I had never considered
excellent excepting as a housewife or a sick-nurse. County news, the
volunteer camp, the drainage of the marsh, the scarcity of well-water,
the want of enterprise in the towns-people, the coming elections--dear
me, she had them all out, whereas father and I, who had undertaken,
as it were, to put our best legs foremost, sat silent and glum. To do
myself justice, I had a racking headache, and for once in my life I
really felt ill, but I might have behaved better than I did.
Mr. Harrod began to thaw slowly under the influence of mother's
kindness. She had such a winning way with her when she chose, that
everybody gave way before it; and I noticed that even from the very