It was confoundedly awkward. I tried to loosen the
button, but it was badly entangled. Then I desperately
pulled at it to tear it off.
"Oh, don't do that," she said. "Let me unfasten it for you."
And taking the threads of the hammock in one of her little hands
and the button in the other, she quickly separated them. "I
should think buttons would be very inconvenient things--at least,
in hammocks," she said smiling. "You see, girls don't have any
such trouble."
I could not understand her manner. She seemed to take my
being there as a matter of course.
"I must beg a thousand pardons for this--this trespass," I
said.
"Trespass!" said she, with a smile. "People don't trespass
on their own land--"
"But it is not my land," said I. "It is your father's for
the time being. I have no right here whatever. I do not know
how to explain, but you must think it very strange to find me
here when you supposed I had started for Europe."
"Oh! I knew you had not started for Europe," said she,
"because I have seen you working in the grounds--"
"Seen me!" I interrupted. "Is it possible?"
"Oh, yes," said she. "I don't know how long you had been
coming when I first saw you, but when I found that fresh bed of
pinks all transplanted from somewhere, and just as lovely as they
could be, instead of the old ones, I spoke to the man; but he did
not know anything about it, and said he had not had time to do
anything to the flowers, whereas I had been giving him credit for
ever so much weeding and cleaning up.
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