said. The remembrance of his hard sinister face sealed her fears. Nothing
but evil could come of having to do with such a man. It was however still
not so much any foreboding of the future that moved Fleda's tears as the
sense of her grandfather's present pain,--the quick answer of her gentle
nature to every sorrow that touched him. His griefs were doubly hers.
Both from his openness of character and her penetration, they could rarely
be felt unshared; and she shared them always in more than due measure.

In beautiful harmony, while the child had forgotten herself in keen
sympathy with her grandfather's sorrows, he on the other hand had half
lost sight of them in caring for her. Again, and this time not before any
house but in a wild piece of woodland, the little wagon came to a stop.

"Ain't there some holly berries that I see yonder?" said Mr.
Ringgan,--"there, through those white birch stems? That's what you were
wanting, Fleda, ain't it? Give your bittersweet to me while you go get
some,--and here, take this knife dear, you can't break it. Don't cut
yourself."

Fleda's eyes were too dim to see white birch or holly, and she had no
longer the least desire to have the latter; but with that infallible tact
which assuredly is the gift of nature and no other, she answered, in a
voice that she forced to be clear, "O yes, thank you, grandpa;"--and
stealthily dashing away the tears clambered down from the rickety little
wagon and plunged with a cheerful _step_ at least through trees and
underbrush to the clump of holly. But if anybody had seen Fleda's
face!--while she seemed to be busied in cutting as large a quantity as
possible of the rich shining leaves and bright berries. Her grandfather's
kindness and her effort to meet it had wrung her heart; she hardly knew
what she was doing, as she cut off sprig after sprig and threw them down