Bell showed the old gentleman into the study and brought him a chair, and looked in the right-hand corners of all the shelves; then she looked in the left-hand corners; then she looked in the middle; then she looked on Papa’s desk, and in it and under it.
Then she looked on the mantel-piece, and in the cupboard, and in the chairs, for there was no knowing _where_ dear Papa would put a book down when his thinking-cap was on. All the time Mr. Grimshaw was delivering a lecture on Paley, and telling her on what points he disagreed with him, and why; and Bell felt as if a teetotum were going round and round inside her head.
At last, in lifting Papa’s dressing-gown, which hung on the back of a chair, she felt something square and heavy in one of the pockets; and—_there_ was the third volume of “Paley’s Evidences.”
She handed it to Mr. Grimshaw with her prettiest smile, and he went away thinking she was a very nice, well-mannered little girl.
And so she was; but—oh dear! when she got back to the window-seat the daylight was nearly gone.
Still, the west was very bright, and perhaps she could just find out.
“And he said, ‘Princess, my heart is yours! Therefore, I pray you, accept my hand, also, and with it my kingdom of Grendalma, which stretches from sea to sea. Ivory palaces shall be yours, and thrones of gold; mantles of peacock feathers, with many chests of precious stones.’ So the princess—”
“Bell!” called Mamma from the next room. “It is too late to read, dear! Blindman’s Holiday, you know, is the most dangerous time for the eyes. So shut the book, like a dear daughter!”
Bell shut the book, of course; but a cloud came over her pleasant face, and two little cross sticks began beating a tattoo on her heart.
Just at that moment came voices under the window,—Carrie and Willy boy, talking earnestly. “Would a princess be very pretty, do you suppose, Willy? prettier than Bell?”
“Ho!” said Willy, “who cares for ‘pretty?’ She wouldn’t be half so nice as Bell. Why, none of the other fellows’ sisters—”
They passed out of hearing; and even so the cloud passed away from Bell’s brow, and she jumped up and shook her head at herself, and ran to give Mamma a kiss, and ask if she would like her tea.