“Certainly. I'll go and stay with Gabriel and send him to you that you may disclose your plan.”
“No, let me go to Gabriel, while you tell him the plan,” said she, hurrying off to the invalid, whom she found sleeping.
She whispered to Clarence that George wished to speak to him, and took his place by the bedside.
Clarence could find no words to express to George his joy and gratitude. He flushed and paled by turns, and finally, stroking his mustache with trembling fingers, and trying to bite it, in his agitation, sat down in silence, while George went into the details of the matter.
“But will she consent?” Clarence exclaimed at last.
“I think she will, for you know how all of them love Gabriel, Mercedes more than all,—and the thought that he is suffering, and Lizzie's distress, and your kindness to him,—all that will furnish a most excellent excuse to do what her heart has been begging for,” said George. “I am going to write now about it.”
“Oh, I shall be so grateful!” Clarence exclaimed.
“Send Lizzie to me, we both must write,” George said.
Clarence went back to the sick room, and said to Lizzie that George wanted her.
Kissing her hand most fervently, he exclaimed in a tremulous whisper: “You are my angel!”