Roy’s manner was grave and matter-of-fact—­a little constrained, perhaps, but not much—­and he looked so exceedingly pale and tired that; without any hesitation, she took him into the school-room, where they were sitting, and gave him the arm-chair by Davie’s sofa.

“Yes, I own to being rather overdone; I have had so much to arrange, for I must leave here tomorrow, as I think you know.”

“The boys told me.”

“I thought they would.  I should have done it myself, but every day I hoped to see you.  It was this fellow’s fault, I suppose,” patting Davie’s head.  “He seems quite well now, and as jolly as possible.  You don’t know what it is to say ‘Good-by,’ David, my son.”  Mr. Roy, who always got on well with children, had a trick of calling his younger pupils “My Son.”

“Why do you say ‘good-by’ at all, then!” asked the child, a mischievous but winning young scamp of six or seven, who had as many tricks as a monkey or a magpie.  In fact, in chattering and hiding things he was nearly as bad as a magpie, and the torment of his governess’s life; yet she was fond of him.  “Why do you bid us good-by, Mr. Roy?  Why don’t you stay always with Miss Williams and me?”

“I wish to God I could.”

She heard that, heard it distinctly, though it was spoken beneath his breath; and she felt the look, turned for one moment upon her as she stood by the window.  She never forgot either—­never, as long as she lived.  Some words, some looks, can deceive, perhaps quite unconsciously, by being either more demonstrative than was meant, or the exaggeration of coldness to hide its opposite; but sometimes a glance, a tone, betrays, or rather reveals, the real truth in a manner that nothing afterward can ever falsify.  For one instant, one instant only, Fortune felt sure, quite sure, that in some way or other she was very dear to Robert Roy.  If the next minute he had taken her into his arms, and said or looked the words which, to an earnest-minded, sincere man like him, constitute a pledge for life, never to be disannulled or denied, she could have hardly have felt more completely his own.

But he did not say them; he said nothing at all; sat leaning his head on his hand, with an expression so weary, so sad, that all the coaxing ways of little Davie could hardly win from him more than a faint smile.  He looked so old, too, and he was but just thirty.  Only thirty—­only twenty-five; and yet these two were bearing, seemed to have borne for years, the burden of life, feeling all its hardships and none of its sweetnesses.  Would things ever change?  Would he have the courage (it was his part, not hers) to make them change, at least in one way, by bringing about that heart-union which to all pure and true natures is consolation for every human woe?

“I wonder,” he said, sitting down and taking David on his knee—­“I wonder if it is best to bear things one’s self, or to let another share the burden?”