“Very well,” said the lady, still smiling. “It shall be so, if you wish it, Bessie. And now tell me how your mamma and Maggie and all the rest are.”
“Oh! they are all very well, except mamma, and she is better, and we are travelling to do her good; and a great many things happened to us, Miss Adams, since you knew us before.”
“I don’t think it has ‘happened’ to you to grow much,” said the lady.
“Oh, yes’m!” answered Bessie. “I used to be five, and now I’m seven; and I’ve been to school too. We’ve all grown pretty old. Baby can walk and talk now.”
“And how do you like my doctor?” asked “Miss Adams,” as Bessie still called her, glancing round at the gentleman who stood beside her.
Bessie looked up at him, and he looked down at her, and when their eyes met, both smiled.
“I like him: he looks good and nice;” and the little girl, who had already twisted a rose or two into the bosom of the lady’s dress, now handed two or three to the doctor in her own graceful, gracious little way.
“What are you going to do with all those bouquets you have tied up so tastily?” asked Dr. Gordon.
Bessie told him whom they were for.
“And who is this for?” asked Mrs. Gordon,—for so she told Bessie to call her,—pointing to that which the small fingers were now arranging.