“Papa has given me a benefaction of £5 for my school-gifts,” said she, “is not that charming? I wish you would come to the feast. Now, do! It is on Easter Tuesday. Won’t you come?”
“Thank you, I am afraid we can’t. I should like it very much.”
“You never will come to me. You have no compassion.”
“We should enjoy coming very much. Perhaps, in the summer, when Margaret is better.”
“Could not she spare any of you? Well, I shall talk to papa, and make him talk to Dr. May. Mrs. Larpent will tell you I always get my way. Don’t I? Good-bye. See if I don’t.”
She departed, and Flora returned to her own business; but Blanche’s interest was gone. Dazzled by the more lavish gifts, she looked listlessly and disdainfully at bodkins, three for twopence. “I wish I might have bought the writing-box for Janet Taylor! Why does not papa give us money to get pretty things for the children?” said she, as soon as they came out.
“Because he is not so rich as Miss Rivers’s papa.”
Flora was interrupted by meeting the Misses Anderson, who asked, “Was not that carriage Mr. Rivers’s of Abbotstoke Grange?”
“Yes. We like Miss Rivers very much,” said Flora, resolved to show that she was acquainted.
“Oh! do you visit her? I knew he was a patient of Dr. May.” Flora thought there was no need to tell that the only call had been owing to the rain, and continued, “She has been begging us to come to her school feast, but I do not think we can manage it.”