The Rosses were the last to depart, Mary in cloak and clogs, while Mr. Edmonstone lamented that it was in vain to offer the carriage; and Mary laughed, and thanked, and said the walk home with Papa was the greatest of treats in the frost and star-light.
‘Don’t I pity you, who always go out to dinner in a carriage!’ were her last words to Laura.
‘Well, Guy,’ said Charlotte, ‘how do you like it?’
‘Very much, indeed. It was very pleasant.’
‘You are getting into the fairy ring,’ said Laura, smiling.
‘Ay’ he said, smiling too; ‘but it does not turn to tinsel. Would it if I saw more of it?’ and he looked at Mrs. Edmonstone.
‘It would be no compliment to ourselves to say so,’ she answered.
‘I suppose tinsel or gold depends on the using,’ said he, thoughtfully; ‘there are some lumps of solid gold among those papers, I am sure, one, in particular, about a trifle. May I see that again? I mean—
‘Little things
On little wings
Bear little souls to heaven.’
‘Oh! that was only a quotation,’ said Amy, turning over the definitions again with him, and laughing at some of the most amusing; while, in the mean time, Philip went to help Laura, who was putting some books away in the ante-room.