She sighs softly.
"Have you come to see me or Aunt Jane ?" asks she; "because Aunt Jane is out--_I'm glad to say_"-- this last pianissimo.
"To see you," says the professor absently.

He is thinking! He has taken her hand, and held it, and dropped it again, all in a state of high bewilderment.
Is _this_ the big, strong, noisy girl of his imaginings?
The bouncing creature with untidy hair, and her clothes pitchforked on to her?
"Well--I hoped so," says she, a little wistfully as it seems to him, every trace of late sauciness now gone, and with it the sudden shyness.
After many days the professor grows accustomed to these sudden transitions that are so puzzling yet so enchanting, these rapid, inconsequent, but always lovely changes "From grave to gay, from lively to severe." "Won't you sit down ?" says his small hostess gently, touching a chair near her with her slim fingers.
"Thank you," says the professor, and then stops short.
"You are----" "Your ward," says she, ever so gently still, yet emphatically.

It is plain that she is now on her very _best_ behavior.

She smiles up at him in a very encouraging way.

"And you are my guardian, aren't you ?" "Yes," says the professor, without enthusiasm.