CHAPTER XLVIII.
THE PRODIGAL
Then came one of those little silences, during which thoughts glide on with the stroke, as it were, of the last sentence or two; and old Winnie Dobbs said at last:
“But I don’t think it would be like a wedding if Master Willie wasn’t here.”
“Stop that,” said Miss Perfect, grimly, and placing the end of the comb, with which she had been adjusting her gray locks, that lay smoothly over her resolute forehead, on a sudden upon old Winnie’s wrist. “I never change my mind when once I’ve made it up. You don’t know, and you can’t know, for your wits are always wool-gathering, all I’ve done for that boy—young man, indeed, I ought to call him—nor the measure of his perversity and ingratitude. I’ve supported him—I’ve educated him—I’ve been everything to him—and at the first opportunity he has turned on me. If I were a total stranger, a Cambridge doctor, or anything else that had never cared or thought about him, he’d have listened to what I had to say, and been influenced by it. He has refused me for his friend—renounced me—chosen other advisers—he’ll soon be married.”
“Dearie me!” interpolated old Winnie, in honest sympathy.
“And although Mr. Trevor wrote to him yesterday to mention my view and conviction, that his marriage ought to be postponed for some little time, I know perfectly it won’t have the slightest effect, no more than those birds twittering.”
The sparrows in the glittering ivy were gossiping merrily in the beams of the setting sun.
“I simply told his friend, Mr. Trevor, and left it to him to acquaint him, not as having any claim whatever on my particular regard any longer, but as a—a human being—just that; you know, Winnie Dobbs, when I make a resolution I can keep it; you remember⸺”