"We cannot be mistaken," Miss McPherson said to Lucy, after Bessie had left them; "but let me manage the young man."
And when, at last, Grey came, and, after greeting the ladies, asked after Bessie, Miss McPherson replied that she was better and had just left them for the garden; and then, as Grey made no move to go in search of her, she suddenly turned upon him with the exclamation:
"Grey Jerrold, you are a fool!"
"Ye-es?" he answered, interrogatively, as he regarded her with astonishment.
"I repeat it—you are either a fool or blind, or both!" she continued. "But I am neither, and I know you love my niece, and she loves you, and I know too that you think she is engaged to Neil McPherson, but she is not."
"What!" Grey exclaimed, starting to his feet. "What are you saying?"
"I am saying that Bessie's engagement was broken before she left England, and that she—"
"She—what?" Grey cried, almost pleadingly; and Miss McPherson rejoined:
"She is in the garden. You will find her in the rose-arbor."
Grey waited for no more, but went rapidly in the direction of the summer-house where Bessie sat with her back to him, and did not see him until his hands were upon her face and his voice said to her: