Page:The Professor's House - Willa Cather.pdf/130

 dreamily. “Roddy was proud. He didn’t like taking orders and living on pay cheques. He liked to be free, and to sit in his saddle all day and use it for a pillow at night. You know Tom said that, Kitty.”

“Anyhow, he was noble. He was always noble, noble Roddy!” Kathleen finished it off.

After the first day, when he had walked into the garden and introduced himself, Tom never took up the story of his own life again, either with the Professor or Mrs. St. Peter, though he was often encouraged to do so. He would talk about the New Mexico country when questioned, about Father Duchene, the missionary priest who had been his teacher, about the Indians; but only with the two little girls did he ever speak freely and confidentially about himself. St. Peter used to wonder how the boy could afford to spend so much time with the children. All through that summer and fall he used to come in the afternoon and join them in the garden. In the winter he dropped in two or three evenings a week to play Five Hundred or to take a dancing-lesson.

There was evidently something enchanting about the atmosphere of the house to a boy who had always lived a rough life. He enjoyed the prettiness and freshness and gaiety of the little girls as if they were flowers. Probably, too, he liked being so attractive to them. A flush of pleasure would