“Please, let me think of something first.”
“Think away. We’ll talk presently, but now I’m going to raise the ghost.” He went lightly after his cropping horse, and Mary sat by the fire.
How all this tilted her balances! He little guessed what deeps he had stirred within her simple soul. Deeps! Why, what fisherman had ever yet dropped his hook below the pretty surface? What evidence had she, or any one, that deeps there were? Oh, the great views at his will and pleasure—this gentleman-tinker’s, who made omelettes in the middle of the night, and talked like a ruler of men, putting down and setting up with unfaltering voice, altering respects, changing relationships like a lawgiver. Poverty—destitution—to go beggared of opinion as well as pence, and to be the richer for it? She might well pout her lips and wrinkle her little nose as she applied all this to her own concerns. Her heart sank to view her own belittling. Gossip, flirtation, little quarrels, and harsh judgments, a nod from Mrs. James, a smile from Miss de Speyne, dresses, a new blouse, young Perivale, Mr. Duplessis, Mr. ——. No, no, not Mr. Germain! Even now there was a faint throb of the heart as she thought of the day after to-morrow, and hugged the comfort of an excitement to come.
“Ready, if you are,” she heard, and rose to join her host. The gentleman-tinker was in the road with his horse and cart, passing the reins along. Bingo, snorting and stretching his hind legs, was very ready for the frolic.
“How’s the ankle?”
“Much better. Too much better.”
“Nonsense. That’s one of the things we must have. I don’t preach abstinence from limbs.”
She laughed. “No, of course not. But I think that I should have liked to be kept in for a day—or two. And I know that I can’t be.”
“You’re better out, I suspect.”
“I’m not sure now—since you have been talking. You have made me think.”