"Are you aware whether they afforded pleasure to Miss Bidaud?"
"Yes, sir, they gave her the greatest possible pleasure. She was always happy after she got one, so my Emily wrote to me. That makes it all the stranger."
"Makes what all the stranger?" Again Mrs. Crawford looked at Basil with a possible doubt of the wisdom of her loquacity; but she was naturally a gossip, and the sluice being open the waters continued to flow.
"Well, sir, my young lady had set her heart upon Mr. Whittingham coming home--that much my daughter knew from what she said; and, although she said nothing about it to Emily, there was something else she set her heart upon. There are some things, you know, sir, a delicate-minded young lady doesn't tell her best friend till they're settled; and perhaps Miss Bidaud herself didn't quite know what her feelings for Mr. Whittingham were. She was very young when she left Australia, and her uncle hadn't been anxious to introduce her to society, so since she's been home she has seen very little of young men. But lookers on can see most of the game, sir, and my Emily said to me, 'When Mr. Whittingham comes home there'll be a match made up, you see if there won't, mother.' 'But how about the uncle?' I asked, for it was pretty clear to me, from what I heard, that there was no love lost between Mr. Bidaud and Mr. Whittingham. Then my Emily tells me that, for all my young lady's gentle ways and manners, she sometimes showed a will of her own when anything very dear to her was in question. That is how she has been able to keep the bird Mr. Corrie gave her; if it hadn't been that she was determined, her uncle would have made away with it long ago. I didn't quite agree with Emily. I argued like this, sir. Supposing, when Mr. Whittingham came home, he and my young lady found they loved each other, and made a match of it. So far, all well and good; but the moment Mr. Bidaud discovered it, he would take steps. He is Miss Bidaud's natural guardian, and my young lady is not yet of age. What would her uncle do? Whip her away, and take her where Mr. Whittingham couldn't get at her. Perhaps discharge Emily, and so deprive Miss Bidaud of every friend she has, and of every opportunity of acting contrary to him. He's artful enough to carry that out. I don't quite know the rights of it, but Emily says he has control of all my young lady's fortune, and she don't believe he has any of his own. Well, then, does it stand to reason that he would let the money he lives upon slip through his fingers through any carelessness of his own, or that he would hand it quietly over to a man he hates like poison? That's the way I urged, sir, but it's all turned out different. Of course you know, sir, that Mr. Basil Whittingham's come home."
"I have heard so," said Basil, quietly.
"And has come into a great fortune!"
"I have heard that, also."
"Miss Bidaud was overjoyed when she saw him, and her uncle was the other way. But if Emily's last two letters mean anything they mean that things have got topsy turvy like. Mr. Whittingham and Mr. Bidaud are great friends now, and as for my young lady being happy, that's more than I can say. There's no understanding young people now; it was different in my time; but there, they say the course of true love never runs smooth. One thing seems pretty plain--there's a screw loose somewhere in Villa Bidaud. And now, sir, I've told you everything, and likely as, not I've been too free, and done what I shouldn't. If I have done wrong I shall never hear the last of it from Emily."
"You will live to acknowledge," said Basil, "that you have done right, and that your confidence is not misplaced. I thank you from my heart, and am grateful for the good fortune that led me to you. Mrs. Crawford, I don't like to offer you money for the service you have rendered me, though I hope I shall be in the humour to insist, before long, upon your allowing me to make a fitting acknowledgment. But there is something I should wish to purchase of you."
"I have nothing to sell, sir, that you would care to have."