The two interlopers, however, blissfully unconscious of the young lady’s sentiments, saw little Paul safe through all the stages of undressing, airy exercise, supper and bed; and then sat down to tea before the fire. The two children now lay, through the good offices of Polly, in one room; and it was not until the ladies were established at their tea-table that, happening to look towards the little beds, they thought of Florence.
“How sound she sleeps!” said Miss Tox.
“Why, you know, my dear, she takes a great deal of exercise in the course of the day,” returned Mrs Chick, “playing about little Paul so much.”
“She is a curious child,” said Miss Tox.
“My dear,” retorted Mrs Chick, in a low voice: “Her Mama, all over!”
“In-deed!” said Miss Tox. “Ah dear me!”
A tone of most extraordinary compassion Miss Tox said it in, though she had no distinct idea why, except that it was expected of her.
“Florence will never, never, never be a Dombey,” said Mrs Chick, “not if she lives to be a thousand years old.”
Miss Tox elevated her eyebrows, and was again full of commiseration.
“I quite fret and worry myself about her,” said Mrs Chick, with a sigh of modest merit. “I really don’t see what is to become of her when she grows older, or what position she is to take. She don’t gain on her Papa in the least. How can one expect she should, when she is so very unlike a Dombey?”