So then we took this new promise of home that has come to make my life, if not joyful, something less than desolate, and analyzed it in its practical bearings. What a pity that all pretty dreams have to be analyzed! I had some notion about throwing our little incomes into a joint family fund, but she put a veto to that; I suppose because mine is the larger. She prefers to take board for herself and Faith; but, if I know myself, she shall never be suffered to have the feeling of a boarder, and I will make her so much at home in my house that she shall not remember that it is not her own.
Her visit to Norwich she has decided to put off until the autumn, so that I shall have her to myself undisturbed all summer.
I have been looking at Roy’s picture a long time, and wondering how he would like the new plan. I said something of the sort to her.
“Why put any ‘would’ in that sentence?” she said, smiling. “It belongs in the present tense.”
“Then I am sure he likes it,” I answered,—“he likes it,” and I said the words over till I was ready to cry for rest in their sweet sound.
22d.
It is Roy’s birthday. But I have not spoken of it. We used to make a great deal of these little festivals,—but it is of no use to write about that.
I am afraid I have been bearing it very badly all day. She noticed my face, but said nothing till to-night. Mrs. Bland was down stairs, and I had come away alone up here in the dark. I heard her asking for me, but would not go down. By and by Aunt Winifred knocked, and I let her in.
“Mrs. Bland cannot understand why you don’t see her, Mary,” she said, gently. “You know you have not thanked her for those English violets that she sent the other day. I only thought I would remind you; she might feel a little pained.”
“I can’t to-night,—not to-night, Aunt Winifred. You must excuse me to her somehow. I don’t want to go down.”