“Not I, quotha,” said he, sitting down by Peggy’s couch and taking her thin little hand in his. “Who can presume to thread the labyrinth of a young lady’s mind, without the least little bit of a clue? You must give me a clue, Peg, if you want me to guess.”
“Well, then, I was thinking of you. Is that a clue?”
“Not much of a one, my pet. You might be thinking anything—that my last coat is a bad fit about the shoulders—a true bill, Peggy; that I am growing stupid and indolent in this inconsistent climate, where one sleeps half the day and lies awake more than half the night.”
“I was thinking of your goodness to Eve, and to all of us. My gold thimble; your bringing us here when you would rather have stayed in Hampshire to hunt. And I was thinking how different our lives would have been if you had never come to Fernhurst. Eve would just have gone on slaving to make both ends meet, cutting out all our frocks, and working her Wilcox and Gibbs, and bearing with father’s temper, and going without things. I should have outgrown my strength all the same; but there would have been no one to bring us to Cannes. I should never have seen the Mediterranean, or the Snow Alps, or mother’s grave. I should never have seen Eve in pretty tea-gowns, with nothing in the world to do except sit about and look lovely. You have changed our lives.”
“For better, Peggy?” he asked earnestly.
“Yes, yes; for worlds and worlds better,” she answered, with her arms round his neck.
Benson had crept off to her dinner; Peggy and her brother-in-law were alone.
“God bless you for that assurance, Peggy dear. And—if—if I were not by any means a perfect Christian—if I had done wicked things in my life—given way to a wicked temper, and done some great wrong, not in treachery but in passion, to a fellow-man—could you love me all the same, Peggy?”
“Of course I could. Do you suppose I ever thought you quite perfect? You wouldn’t be half so nice if you were outrageously good. I know you could never be false or treacherous. And as for getting in a passion, and even hitting people, I shouldn’t love you one morsel the less for that. I have often wanted to hit people myself. My own sister Sophy, for instance, when she has been too provoking, with her superior airs and high-flown notions. Kiss me, Jack, again and again. If you were ever so wicked I think I should love you all the same.”