He would rather astonish me if he came to such an end."
"Yes; I don't expect anything of him either," said Gregory, zealously.
"Well, I don't know," said Lyndall; "there are some small things I rather
look to him for. If he were to invent wings, or carve a statue that one
might look at for half an hour without wanting to look at something else, I
should not be surprised. He may do some little thing of that kind perhaps,
when he has done fermenting and the sediment has all gone to the bottom."
Gregory felt that what she said was not wholly intended as blame.
"Well, I don't know," he said sulkily; "to me he looks like a fool. To
walk about always in that dead-and-alive sort of way, muttering to himself
like an old Kaffer witchdoctor! He works hard enough, but it's always as
though he didn't know what he was doing. You don't know how he looks to a
person who sees him for the first time."
Lyndall was softly touching the little sore foot as she read, and Doss, to
show he liked it, licked her hand.
"But, Miss Lyndall," persisted Gregory, "what do you really think of him?"
"I think," said Lyndall, "that he is like a thorn-tree, which grows up very
quietly, without any one's caring for it, and one day suddenly breaks out
into yellow blossoms."
"And what do you think I am like?" asked Gregory, hopefully.
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