She draws the basket towards her, and slowly and with care unties the true lover's knot of pale blue ribbon that fastens it.
"Flowers, I expect," says Margaret.
"But tied up like this?"
"That is because there is a letter inside it."
"You seem to know all about it," says Tita, at which Margaret grows a little red, and wishes, like the parrot, that she had not spoken.
"Yes; it is flowers," says Tita.
"Such flowers!" cries Margaret. And, indeed, it is a rare basketful of Nature's sweetest gifts that lies before them. Delicate reds, and waxen whites, and the tender greens of the waving fern. "How beautiful!" exclaims Margaret.
Tita has said nothing. But now she puts out her hand.
"What is that?" says she.
"Why, the letter," says Margaret, forgetting her late discomfiture in the excitement of this new discovery.