As Florence pressed forward to gaze upon the bright blossoms she saw that the owner of the cottage had become aware of her approach, and was standing at the gate peering at her curiously. From the description she had received, it was easy to recognize directly the good woman of whose kindness of heart Susan Denham had spoken so warmly; yet so queer was her appearance that it was scarcely possible to resist a smile.
Mrs. Bick was so tall and largely framed that she looked out of all proportion with her tiny dwelling, and her list-slippered feet, which the curtness of her narrow skirts well displayed, were positively enormous. Her only sacrifice to the Graces consisted of two bunches of bright-brown curls, which were surmounted by a net cap, surrounded by double quillings of lace. As these borders were very limp, and the curls had a tendency to slip over Mrs. Bick’s forehead whenever she stooped, they were generally awry, and the gray hairs they were intended to conceal stuck out in little fuzzy bunches above or below them.
Florence introduced herself by presenting Susan’s note. It was turned over and over dubiously, and then thrust back into her hand.
“Just read it, will ye? Dannle’s out at work, and my speckittles is indoors.”
Mrs. Bick nodded her head gravely when she had heard the contents of the missive.
“Susan Denham! Ha! that’s the quiet un. A decent young woman she was, too—very different to that highty-flighty cousin that used to pluck Dannle’s best flowers with never a ‘by your leave,’ at all. So you wants my rooms, do ye?”
“I should like to look at them and see whether they would suit me,” answered Florence, a little perplexed between the easy familiarity of Mrs. Bick’s address and the gathering frowns with which Mr. Heriton was listening to it.
“Look and welcome. My place is clean if ’tain’t nothing else. Have ye got ere a pin about ye to pin up them long skirts? For Dannle’s ginger (Virginia) stock is a-coming out in the borders, and he can’t abide to see it broken off.”
Florence humored the woman by drawing her dress carefully around her as she followed her tall form up the narrow pathway.
“It’s a silly fancy, them flowers, for poor folks like we,” said Mrs. Bick, turning round when she reached the porch and confidentially addressing her visitors, “and so I’ve told Dannle times out o’ mind. If he took to anything, he might ha’ took to a pig or fowls; or even rabbits’d been better than nothing, for there’s many a good meal to be had off of them; but there’s neither vittles nor drink in flowers, and they’re here to-day and gone to-morrow, aren’t they? Such rubbidge for poor folk like we to take up wi’, ain’t it?”