“Quite well,” said Bessy, “I do not think my mother can be long. And I’m sure she’ll be glad to see you. We do not see many friends now,” said Bessy; and then she could have bitten her tongue that she had said it; he might believe that she hinted at his mother and sisters.
“After all, Miss Carraways,” said Basil, “how very few people there are worth thinking friends.”
“It may be so, sir; I fear it is so; but,” said Bessy, “it is a hard truth to learn, learn it when we may.”
Basil was again at fault; again his tongue hung fire; and he wondered, and was a little piqued at the self-possession of Bessy, when he—a man—was in such a tremor. His brain was wandering for new words, when happily, his eyes fell upon the superb bunch of heartsease idly grasped by his hand. “Happily, Miss Carraways,” said Basil, suddenly supported, “happily there are friends that will smile upon us till death.”
“Oh dear, yes! Life, indeed, would be a sad lot could we not think so,” and Bessy’s eyes glistened; and glistening, made Basil wince.
She never looked so beautiful. Heaped about with luxury; a little rose-bud queen in a golden palace, with fairy birds singing to her, and happiness like an atmosphere around her—she never looked so beautiful as in that bit of tenpenny muslin—standing upon Kidderminster, at the rate of eighteen shillings a-week, boots included. (Now all this went jumbling, jostling through the brain of Basil, as he caught the dewy flash of Bessy’s innocent blue eyes.)
“There are friends, Miss Carraways, whom you have been kind to, who still have grateful looks. There are friends, I saw thousands of them yesterday, looking all the happier for your care. I was told of some, for whom you had a particular regard. I”—here Basil began again to feel abashed and tongue-tied. “I mean friends by the outer wall, opposite the summer-house with—with Diana in it”—
“I recollect the summer-house,” said Bessy, and her little hand clutched the back of a chair.
“Of course. I was sure you would. Well, the truth is, my dear lady—pardon me, Miss Carraways—I was there, and I thought you would like to see some of these friends, and—the fact is,—my dear Bessy—ten million pardons, madam, I—the fact is, as I said, thinking you would like to see them, I gave them a—a general invitation,—have brought ’em here, and here they are.”
Basil held the heartsease towards Bessy. She curtseyed, held her trembling hand to take them. “Thank you! A thousand thanks!” she smiled. And then she fell in a chair, and burying her face among the flowers, gave up her heart to weeping.