use has smothered it. She undressed phrases, making them shine out alone.
'Moping, child?' he asked once, when one of her silent fits had been somewhat prolonged. 'Unhappy?'
'No, Uncle. And I'm not moping.'
'What is it, then?'
'Fräulein told me I was selfish, rather.'
'That's all right,' he said to comfort her. 'Be yourself—selfish—or you're nothing.'
She followed her own thought, perhaps not understanding him quite.
'She said I must put my Self out more for others. Mother used to say it too.'
He turned and stared at her. The little face was very grave.
'Eh?' he asked. 'Put your Self out?'
Mánya nodded, fixing her eyes, half dreamy, upon his own. She had been far away. Now she was coming back.
'So I'm learning,' she said, her voice coming as from a distance. 'It's so funny. But it's not really difficult—a bit. I could teach you, I think, if you'd promise faithfully to practise regularly.'
There was a pause before he asked the next question.
'How d'you do it, child?' came a little gruffly, for he felt queer emotion rising in him.
She shrugged her shoulders.
'Oh, I couldn't tell you like that. I could only show you.'
There was a touch of weirdness about the child. It stole into him—a faint sense of eeriness, as though she were letting him see through peepholes into that other world she knew so well.
