"I am thanking you," said she. "I will not be caring much to walk, now
that my father is come home."

"But I think he has gone out himself and left you here alone," said I.

"And do you think that was very kindly said?" she asked.

"It was not unkindly meant," I replied. "What ails you, Catriona? What
have I done to you that you should turn from me like this?"

"I do not turn from you at all," she said, speaking very carefully. "I
will ever be grateful to my friend that was good to me; I will ever be
his friend in all that I am able. But now that my father James More is
come again, there is a difference to be made, and I think there are some
things said and done that would be better to be forgotten. But I will
ever be your friend in all that I am able, and if that is not all that
. . . if it is not so much. . . . Not that you will be caring! But I would
not have you think of me too hard. It was true what you said to me, that
I was too young to be advised, and I am hoping you will remember I was
just a child. I would not like to lose your friendship, at all events."

She began this very pale; but before she was done, the blood was in her
face like scarlet, so that not her words only, but her face and the
trembling of her very hands, besought me to be gentle. I saw for the
first time, how very wrong I had done to place the child in that
position, where she had been entrapped into a moment's weakness, and now
stood before me like a person shamed.

"Miss Drummond," I said, and stuck, and made the same beginning once
again, "I wish you could see into my heart," I cried. "You would read