CHAPTER XX

A SIMPLE CONVERSATION

One day, when Rosalie had about completed the stone she was engaged upon, the Governor sent for her, by the frog.

“And I think,” said Brightcoat, for Rosalie had changed its name, not liking Croaker, “that it would not be at all a bad plan for us to look and see if there are any new clothes anywhere about. This old dress you are wearing is most worn and shabby.”

“There are none,” said she. “I have looked many a time, and have never found anything except the coarse brown apron I wear to protect my dress from the soil.”

“Well, there’s a time, and not a time, for looking for things. Suppose we look in the little wardrobe together now. If you stay dinner with the Governor, you must be fairly suitably dressed for it.”

And what was Rosalie’s surprise, on looking in the diminutive dress-closet, to find a pretty dress of softest silk, white and apple green, just ready made to fit her figure, and everything besides to match, even to silken stockings and pretty slippers, and a cluster of red and golden leaves upon the dressing-table, as simple and pretty as the rest.

Rosalie, from feeling old as the hills, suddenly felt young as a blue-bell blowing on an early summer morning.

“Oh, Brightcoat! I never felt so happy in my life. To get rid of this old black and red thing! Why, that in itself is Paradise. But to wear these! It’s past belief. Now, if you were me, how would you wear your hair—high or low? Which do you think suits me?”

“I say in that loose bundle at the back you used to wear when you first came to us.”

“The way Mariana did it.”

“Was it?”

“Yes. Oh, dear, dear! I’m afraid I shan’t do it a bit nicely. When you try to do your hair nicely it always looks hideous; have you ever noticed that?”

“No; you see I haven’t got any.”

“Of course not! My dress is almost the exact colours of your skin. Have you noticed it?”

“Yes. My master said the colours were chosen out of compliment to me.”

“How delightful! Frog green! It’s quite an innovation in fashions, and a very pretty one.”

Brightcoat’s eyes sparkled with pleasure at this little bit of innocent flattery, and if it showed vanity, vanity of a sort is a very delightful thing.

So Rosalie dressed with fluttering happiness and eager haste.

“Your hair doesn’t look a bit as if you’d taken pains with it,” said the frog from the bed, where it was sitting.

“What do you mean?” she asked, with sudden alarm.

“It’s very becoming.”

“I’d rather your flattery was a little less open. I know you mean well, but it’s embarrassing to have one’s defects spoken of so charmingly.”

By this time the dressing was completed, and in the eyes of her simple companion no one had ever looked more lovely.

“You must come too, Brightcoat. I shouldn’t think of leaving you here alone. Besides, you are always welcome at the house, and I am only there on suffrage. If I behave badly I must go. It’s a very terrible thing that, when you think about it. Enough to make me tremble and shake all over.”

So the frog jumped lightly from the bed on to her shoulder, and made a most delightful ornament.

As they walked across the garden to the house the nightingales were singing in the soft still air of night.

The Governor, who was walking on the terrace, greeted his guests, and they passed into the house, which was all brilliantly lit to receive them.

“This is your last night with us, so I have asked you here to dine with me,” said the old man.

“My last night?” Her voice was full of wonder and sadness.

“You surely will not be sorry to leave the soil?”

“Ah! but you and Brightcoat are here. I would much rather stay. Besides, my heart is in the garden yet, and here with the jewels that I brought to you. Oh, you have been my friend; and there is none other. Where else can I go? Let me still live in the little hut, with the freedom I have bought to-night.”

But he shook his head and smiled as they sat down to dinner just alone.

“You imagine you have become attached to the hut. But there are other and better places, believe me.”

“And does the way back lead as I came?”

“Pretty much so, I believe.”

“Into Marble House, with its shadows and cobwebs. I’m sure I daren’t go.”

“Perhaps it has become less shadowy since you were there. There is spring cleaning, you know, in all well-regulated houses.”

“But it is not well regulated. There is one part all moths and mildew, and people live in it, or rather work there. I know, for Mariana does. How I should love to see her once again! And upstairs it is wretchedly lit. In fact, Mr. Barringcourt’s private room was the only human-looking place I ever saw there. But perhaps by now he has a wife. But she’ll need great strength of mind to get the necessary repairs done, I’m thinking. He seemed as if he would be very conservative, except where things affected his own comfort.”

“I don’t think he’s got a wife yet,” said the Governor.

When they had finished the meal, and the frog had had its full share of the dainties that were to its taste, the Governor led the way to his own room, and placing a chair for Rosalie near the fire, he drew his own to the other side of the fireplace and sat down.

“Do you object to smoke?” he asked.

“Oh, no! Uncle had a pipe that he had smoked for years and years and years. And the night before he died he let it fall, and it broke. I remember how sad he looked at the time—and perhaps there was more in it than just the breaking of the pipe, for he said nothing, but that he could soon get a new one. And if all things had been right I think it would have angered him.”

“You were greatly attached to your uncle?”

“Oh, yes! I loved them both. No one could have been kinder to me than they.”

“And now, when you go back to Lucifram, you have neither friend nor relation to go to.”

“No. Must I indeed go?”

“I see no other way for it. But there are some friends of mine live there, or friends of someone that I know. They will fill, to the best of their ability, the old place.”

“How do you know? They might take the utterest distaste to me on first sight, and then what would happen?”

“They are not people of prejudice.”

“I wish I were not.”

“You fear, then, you may take a dislike to them?”

“Oh, no! I’m always trying to get the better of my feelings, because they are so often wrong.”

“Well,” said he, “second thoughts are best. I give you the benefit of a second opinion upon most things.”

“But there is where I fear to go back to Lucifram. It’s a place where one is so terribly misjudged, and it’s a place, too, where you have just the knack of saying the things you wished unsaid.”

“Well, then, choose. Will you go back, or will you stay?”

But Rosalie, on second thoughts, made answer:

“You know best, and it is for you to choose. Somehow, I could not think to doubt or question what you say; and after all, why should one bother about to-morrow, if one does one’s duty to-day.”

“And I have promised you friends in the place of your aunt and uncle.”

“Yes; but I thought Mr. Barringcourt might have a word to say about that.”

“Well, we’re all bound to trust the future to a certain extent. There is no telling; on second acquaintance he might prove kinder.”

“When must I go?”

“To-morrow, in the early morning. The journey takes a day; it will be dark before you reach your journey’s end, for autumn is far advanced with them.”

Here the frog, who had so far sat quiet on the hearthrug, put in a word.

“It will be very lonely going back to Lucifram alone. My advice and companionship might be of some little help occasionally.”

“Oh, yes!” cried Rosalie eagerly. “You have been such a faithful and loving friend to me, that your brightness would dispel half the gloom, I’m sure it would.”

Both of them turned their eyes toward the Governor to gain his opinion.

“You bear a charmed life, little frog,” said he, “so I don’t see what harm or inconvenience can happen to you. In fact, I think the outing would be a pleasant trip for you, and add something to your store of knowledge.”

“You don’t think,” said Rosalie anxiously, for second thoughts were beginning to intrude themselves, “that any harm could come of it. I remember Mr. Barringcourt saying something about vivisection once. It would be terrible if anything happened, and I was powerless to prevent it.”

“I don’t think anything could happen,” replied the Governor. “A frog that has once jumped from Lucifram successfully to heaven could, on a pinch, repeat the process with much less inconvenience.”

And soon after this the interview and evening ended.