As she came
nearer, the moon, which hung transfixed upon the flaming spear of a
glacier peak, revealed a distressed little face, through whose
transparent surface you might watch the play of emotions within, as
one watches the doings of tiny insects and fishes in an aquarium.
"What have they been doing to my little girl?" asked Fern, with a
voice full of paternal tenderness. "She has been crying, poor little
thing."
He may have been imprudent in addressing a girl of seventeen in this
tender fashion; but the truth was, her short skirts and the two long
braids of yellow hair were in his mind associated with that age toward
which you may, without offence, assume the role of a well-meaning
protector, and where even a kiss need not necessarily be resented. So
far from feeling flattered by the unwished-for recollection of Elsie's
feeling for him, he was rather disposed to view it as a pathological
phenomenon,--as a sort of malady, of which he would like to cure her.
It is not to be denied, however, that if this was his intention, the
course he was about to pursue was open to criticism. But it must be
borne in mind that Fern was no expert on questions of the
heart,--that he had had no blighting experiences yielding him an
unwholesome harvest of premature wisdom.
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