“Oh, nurse, do you believe me capable of loving one who does not love me?”
“No. Who said he doesn't love you? What was he there for? I stick to that.”
“Now, nurse, dear, be reasonable; if Mr. Dodd loved me, would he go to sleep in my presence?”
“Eh! Miss Lucy, the poor soul was maybe asleep before you left your room.”
“It is all the same. He slept while I stood close to him ever so long. Slept while I—If I loved anybody as these gentlemen pretend they love us, should I sleep while the being I adored was close to me?”
“You are too hard upon him. 'The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.' Why, miss, we do read of Eutychus, how he snoozed off setting under Paul himself—up in a windy—and down a-tumbled. But parson says it wasn't that he didn't love religion, or why should Paul make it his business to bring him to life again, 'stead of letting un lie for a warning to the sleepy-headed ones. ''Twas a wearied body, not a heart cold to God,' says our parson.”
“Now, nurse, I take you at your word. If Eutychus had been Eutycha, and in love with St. Paul, Eutycha would never have gone to sleep, though St. Paul preached all day and all night; and if Dorcas had preached instead of St. Paul, and Eutychus been in love with her, he would never have gone to sleep, and you know it.”
At this home-thrust Mrs. Wilson was staggered, but the next moment her sense of discomfiture gave way to a broad expression of triumph at her nursling's wit.
“Eh! Miss Lucy,” cried she, showing a broadside of great white teeth in a rustic chuckle, “but ye've got a tongue in your head. Ye've sewed up my stocking, and 'tisn't many of them can do that.” Lucy followed up her advantage.
“And, nurse, even when he was wide awake and stood by the cart, no inward sentiment warned him of my presence; a sure sign he did not love me. Though I have never experienced love, I have read of it, and know all about it.” [Jus-tice des Femmes!]