She tried to smile in a proper casual way.
"Oh, it was a small thing, really," was her effort at treating the matter lightly; "but it seems more important to me than it would to any one with--with a family.

The people I live with--who have been so kind to me--are going away." "The Cupps ?" he asked.
She turned quite round to look at him.
"How," she faltered, "did you know about them ?" "Maria told me," he answered, "I asked her." It seemed such a human sort of interest to have taken in her.

She could not understand.

And she had thought he scarcely realised her existence.
She said to herself that was so often the case--people were so much kinder than one knew.
She felt the moisture welling in her eyes, and stared steadily at the heather, trying to wink it away.
"I am really glad," she explained hastily.

"It is such good fortune for them.