as already at that duty. Mrs. Armour had
had the presence of mind to send for Colvin; but presently, when
the general spoke, she thought it better that Marion should go, and
counselled returning to breakfast and not making the matter of too
much importance. This they did, Richard very reluctantly; while Marion,
rather pleased than not at the spirit shown by the strange girl, ran
away over the grass towards the lake, where Lali had now stopped. There
was a little bridge at one point where the lake narrowed, and Lali,
evidently seeing it all at once, went towards it, and ran up on it,
standing poised above the water about the middle of it. For an instant
an unpleasant possibility came into Marion's mind: suppose the excited
girl intended suicide! She shivered as she thought of it, and yet--!
She put that horribly cruel and selfish thought away from her with an
indignant word at herself. She had passed Mackenzie, and came first to
the lake. Here she slackened, and waved her hand playfully to the girl,
so as not to frighten her; and then with a forced laugh came up panting
on the bridge, and was presently by Lali's side. Lali eyed her a little
furtively, but, seeing that Marion was much inclined to be pleasant, she
nodded to her, said some Indian words hastily, and spread out her hands
towards the water. As she did so, Marion noticed again the beauty of
those hands and the graceful character of the gesture, so much so that
she forgot the flat hair and the unstayed body, and the rather broad
feet, and the delicate duskiness, which had so worked upon her in
imagination and in fact the evening before. She put her hand kindly on
that long slim hand stretched out beside her, and, because she knew
not what else to speak, and because the tongue is very perverse at
times,--saying the opposite of what is expected,--she herself blundered
out, "How! How! Lali."

Perhaps Lali was as much surprised at the remark as Marion herself, and
certainly very much more delighted. The sound of those familiar
words, spoken by accident as they were, opened the way to a better
understanding, as nothing else could possibly have done. Marion was
annoyed with herself, and yet amused too. If her mind had been perfectly
assured regarding Captain Vidall, it is probable that then and there
a peculiar, a genial, comradeship would have been formed. As it was,
Marion found this little event more endurable than she expected. She
also found that Lali, when she l