When those deep gray eyes looked into mine, my drooping lashes tried to
conceal from their searching gaze, my mutinous thoughts. Strange that
this particular evening, while I sat with the half forgotten letter in my
pocket, imagination was busier than ever, while I found it more than
usually difficult to comprehend Lessing's ponderous thoughts; and the
desire seized me to leave these high thinkers, on their lonely mountain
heights, and, with my guardian, come down to the summer places of
everyday life.
He noticed my abstraction at last, for he said abruptly:
"Are you not interested in to-day's lesson, Medoline?"
I faltered as I met his searching eye.
"I am always interested in what you say, Mr. Winthrop; but to-day my
thoughts have been wandering a good deal."
"Where have they been wandering to?"
My face crimsoned, but I kept silent.
"I would like to know what you were thinking about?" he said, gently.
"A young girl's foolish fancies would seem very childish to you, after
what you have been talking about."
"Nevertheless, we like sometimes the childish and innocent. I have a
fancy for it just now, Medoline."
"Please, Mr. Winthrop, I cannot tell you all my thoughts. They are surely
my own, and cannot be torn from me ruthlessly."
"What sort of persons are you meeting now at your Mill Road Mission?"
He suddenly changed the conversation, to my intense relief.
"The very same that I have met all along, with the exception of the Sykes
family--they are a new experience.
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