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.

Lyndall looked up from her book.

"Like a little tin duck floating on a dish of water, that comes after a
piece of bread stuck on a needle, and the more the needle pricks it the
more it comes on."

"Oh, you are making fun of me now, you really are!" said Gregory feeling
wretched. "You are making fun, aren't you, now?"

"Partly. It is always diverting to make comparisons."