Читать книгу The Primrose Path: A Chapter in the Annals of the Kingdom of Fife онлайн

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“Do you remember Rob Glen, papa, the son of Mrs. Glen at Earl’s-lee? He used to play with me when I was a child; he was always very kind to me. Oh, don’t shake your head; you must mind him. Robert Glen at the farm?”

“I mind, as you say—Scotch, Scotch, little Peggy; you should not be so Scotch—a Robert Glen who took the farm thirty or forty years ago. By-the-bye, the lease must be almost out; but how you are to get drawing or anything else out of a rough farmer—”

“Papa!”— Margaret put her hand upon his shoulder with impatience—“how could it be a Robert Glen of thirty or forty years ago? He is only a little older than me. He played with me when I was a little girl. He is perhaps the son, or he may be the grandson. He is a little older than me.”

“Get your pronouns right, my little Peggy. Ah! the son; va pour le fils,” said Sir Ludovic, with a drowsy smile, and turned back to his book. Margaret stood for a moment with her hand on his shoulder, looking at him with that irritation which is the earliest form of pain. A vague uneasiness came into her mind, but it was so veiled in this impatience that she did not recognize it for what it was. The only conscious feeling she had was, how provoking of papa! not to take more interest, not to ask more, not to say anything. Then she dropped her hand from his shoulder and turned away, and went to sit in the window with the first chance book she could pick up. She was not thinking much about the book. She was half annoyed and disappointed to have got her own way so easily. Had he understood her? Margaret did not feel quite happy about this facile assent. It made of Rob Glen no wonder at all, no disturbing individuality. He was something more, after all, than Sir Ludovic thought. What was all her own tremor for, if it was to be lightly met with a va pour le fils? She was not satisfied; and indeed the little rustlings of her impatience, her subdued movements, as she sat behind, did all for her father that he wanted. They kept him awake. The drowsiness which comforted him, yet which he was afraid of, fled before this little thrill of movement. Even if she had been altogether quiet, is there not a thrill and reverberation in the air about a thinking creature? Sir Ludovic was kept awake and alive by the consciousness of another near him, living in every nerve, filling the silence with a little thrill of independent being. This kept him, not only from dozing, but even from active occupation with his book. After a little while he too began to be restless, turned the pages hastily, then himself turned half round toward her. “My Peggy!” he said. In a moment she was standing by his side.