Page:Emma Speed Sampson--The shorn lamb.djvu/70

66 itself. All of them gazed at the child, whose many parcels began slipping from her arms as she stood, her great brown eyes glued to Spottswood, whose yellow hair was shining in the sun.

"Father! Father!" she cried. "I—I—didn't know!" She started towards him and then stopped. "Oh, I beg your pardon, sir. I thought—just for a moment—you seemed to be my father. You see the last time I remember him he was in a blue painting smock with the light from the skylight in the studio turning his hair to gold. I see now I was mistaken."

Spottswood looked at her in sullen silence. Her mourning bonnet had slipped to the back of her neck. Her black hair was in great disorder, as the child had never before tried to comb and brush it, that being Mrs. O' Shea's duty. She presented a strange appearance to her kinspeople as she stood before them. She looked from one to the other, shrewdly taking in the hostile attitude of her aunts, whose relationship to herself she partly divined, and then she fixed her attention on her grandfather. She fancied she saw encouragement in his expression.

Major Taylor's heart was behaving strangely. It was beating like a trip hammer and there was something in his throat that bade fair to