“Did you want me?” Miss Harding asked, going up to the tiny blossom of a creature.
“My father, then, Dr. Harding,--were you sent for him?”
The child surveyed her, as if in gentle surprise at so much curiosity.
“No,” she answered, after a moment. “I am Rosebud; and I don’t want anybody. Jane told me to come here, and she would follow presently.”
She said the words with a singular correctness and propriety, as if they were a lesson which she had been taught.
Evidently the process of training had gone no further. The child looked puzzled and uncomfortable.
“Jane?” she answered hesitatingly. “Why, she is Jane.”
“She told me to come, and she would follow presently,” said the child, saying her little lesson over again.
Evidently there was nothing more to be got out of her; but Miss Harding coaxed her to come into the cool parlor, and wait for Jane; and gave her some strawberries and cream in a gayly painted china saucer, that all children liked. Rosebud was no exception to the rest. When she had finished her berries, she tapped on the saucer with her spoon.
“I will have it for mine, while I stay,--may I?” she said. “Not to take away, but just to call, you know.”
“Surely,” said Miss Harding, more puzzled than ever. Had the sprite, then, come to stay? Were there, by chance, fairies after all,--and was this some changeling from out their ranks? She tried to entertain her small guest; and she found her quite accessible to the charms of pictures, and contented for an hour with a box of red and white chessmen. Towards night her curiosity got the better of her courtesy; and, looking from the window, she inquired,--
“Presently; Jane said presently,” answered the child, with quiet composure, and returned to the chessmen.
Miss Harding heard her father drive into the yard, and slipped out to speak to him. She told her story, and the doctor gave a low, soft whistle. It was a way he had when any thing surprised him.
“It looks to me,” said he, “as if Jane, whoever she may be, intended to make us a present of Miss Rosebud. Well, we must make the small person comfortable to-night, and to-morrow we will see what to do with her.”
The small person was easily made comfortable. She ate plenty of bread-and-milk for her supper, and more strawberries; and when it was over, she went round and stood beside the doctor.