“And peacocks,” sobbed the little woman, “than it is to me. Ah, my dear, when you marry—”
“I shall never marry, Mrs Bolter,” said Grey, with a sad ring in her voice.
“Oh, you don’t know, my child. I used to say so, and think that I was as firm as a rock, and as hard as iron; but, oh, these men—these men—when once you listen to their dreadful, insinuating talk, they seem to get the better of your proper judgment, and end by completely turning you round their finger.”
Grey smiled in her face and kissed her.
“There, there!” cried Mrs Bolter, changing her tone, “I am afraid I have lowered myself terribly in your eyes this morning, my dear. I’m growing into a very, very strange creature, and dreadfully weak! Those torturing thoughts keep suggesting to my foolish heart that the doctor has gone up the river on purpose to see the Inche Maida!”
“Oh, no; he cannot!” said Grey, smiling.
“Well, perhaps not, my dear; but whether or no, if he was to come back now, and confess that he had done so, I feel perfectly certain that, after scolding him well, I should forgive him. I’ve grown to be a very different body to the one you knew when you used to come to us from the Miss Twettenhams’.”
“Now, look here, dear Mrs Bolter,” said Grey, who, in her friend’s trouble, seemed to have changed places with her, and become the elder of the two, “I believe Dr Bolter to be a really good, true man, to whom I should go in trouble and speak to as if he were my father, sure that he would be kind and wise, and help and protect me, whether my trouble were mental or bodily.”
“My dear,” cried Mrs Bolter, gazing at her with admiration, “you talk like a little Solomon! Ah!” she cried impatiently, “I wish there had never been a Solomon at all!”
“Why?” said Grey, wonderingly.