The Truant Spirit Read Online Free PDF Page A

said, and Sabina was surprised by the simple affection in his voice. “It might have been only yesterday that you saw me, instead of a year ago. Haven’t you had that catch dealt with yet?”
    “Nobody uses that room but you,” Bunny said. “I should have remembered. But come into the warm, dear boy. Was it the weather that delayed you?”
    “No, not entirely,” he said. “I’ve brought another guest for the night, Bunny. I hope it won’t be too much trouble to fix up a room. Come out of your retirement, young lady, and meet our Bunny, who has always had a welcome for everyone.”
    Sabina advanced uncertainly into the circle of light, but she did not think the welcome of Brock’s governess extended so universally as he imagined. Bunny surveyed her shrewdly, and there was reservation in her voice and a gentle air of reproof as she said:
    “Could you not have let me know, Brock? There are no fires lighted in the other rooms and the beds are not aired.”
    “I’m sorry, my dear,” Brock answered with rather puckish enjoyment, “but I hadn’t met the young lady myself until a couple of hours ago. This is Miss Sabina Lamb. She has run away from a rich fiance she has never met and has lost her purse and her luggage on the way.”
    Bunny gave him a long look. “Have you been drinking?” she asked with mild severity.
    “No,” he replied quite seriously. “I called for a quick one on the road, where I met our runaway. In the circumstances I could do nothing else but bring her with me. Will you ask us in, Bunny dear? Your guest has an aversion to the graveyard.”
    “Of course, of course,” Bunny said, annoyed that surprise should have made her appear lacking in hospitality, but she added a little reprovingly as she closed the door: “A graveyard should not be shunned by the living. We all have to come to it.” Sabina, chilled by the reminder, stood in the shadowy hall, feeling lost and alien. She was unused to lamplight and the peculiar stillness of a country house. The shadows played tricks with her unaccustomed eyes and she knew that she was unwanted by these two strangers upon whom fate had so perversely thrust her. She became aware that the governess had picked up one of the small oil lamps and was inspecting her more closely in the light. She had placed her pince-nez on her long pinched nose and through them her round brown eyes observed with the deliberate summing up of her profession. She was really rather like a rabbit, Sabina thought uneasily, with her round mild eyes and slightly protuberant teeth.
    “Why, she’s only a child,” Bunny said then, and for some reason her voice sounded sharp and impatient.
    “Nineteen, so she tells me,” Brock observed, watching with amusement, “but that can be an age of much knowledge these sophisticated days.”
    Bunny gave him a disapproving look, and the lenses of her pince-nez flashed in the light as she set the lamp down again.
    “If I didn’t know you better, Brock—” she began, and he grinned.
    “How well do you think you know me?” he interrupted. “Miss Sabina Lamb has been convinced for some time past of my base designs, haven’t you, Sabina?”
    “Then she should know better than to accompany a perfect stranger to an unknown destination even if she has lost her luggage,” said Bunny tartly, but as she saw the girl began to sway a little on her feet she turned her back firmly on Brock.
    “What am I thinking of!” she exclaimed. “You look exhausted, child, and feverish, too, if I’m not mistaken. Come into the living-room and sit by the fire while I get you both some hot soup.”
    Sabina followed her into a room on the right of the hall and sank thankfully on to a wooden settle by the fire. She had never seen such a vast open hearth before. The chimney was like a cavern and you could roast an ox with ease, she thought. The room was long and low-ceilinged, and smoke had turned the whitewash between the beams to a dusty yellow. There was a