"Would you like these primroses, miss?" Mrs. Rumbelow asked, rising stiffly from her chair when her visitors, who had thanked her gratefully for having sheltered them, were about to leave; "Dick will get me some more to-morrow." It was May she addressed.
"Oh, no, no!" May answered quickly, "but thank you all the same! These buds we have will open in water. She—" nodding at her companion— "never saw a primrose before to-day."
"Then they don't grow in India?" said Mrs. Rumbelow inquiringly.
Josephine smiled at the idea.
"Oh, no!" she replied. "But my father had told me about them—how sweet they are; and I had been looking forward to see them, of course I dare say you know that my father's in France—somewhere?"
"Yes, miss, Jane's told me. May God Almighty bless and keep him."
"He will," Josephine said earnestly, "I know He will."
Her bright young eyes met the old woman's sympathetic gaze for a minute, then grew misty. She took Mrs. Rumbelow's work-hardened hand, the joints of which were swelled and knotted, and pressed it softly. "May we come and see you again?" she asked.
"Indeed, I wish you would, miss," was the pleased response, "I should be pleased!"
"Then of course we will!" May cried, adding: "I wish we'd thought of coming to see you before!"