"I did not mean anything rude," she said, edging her own tub a little nearer, while the forget-me-nots on her bosom danced like flowers on a river, when the mill-stream lifts; "I say things I ought not to say—what I mean is, I say things without meaning them."
"Whatever you say is the sweetest of the sweet," he answered with a sigh, that made his waistcoat keep the tune; "and it is right to remind me of my distance, Miss Cranleigh; because I was taking liberties."
"I defy you to say such a thing to me again. You have not the least idea what I am like, when—when I feel that I have been unkind."
"Let me know what it is like," he whispered, "when—when you feel that you are getting kind again. O Grace, Grace, how I do love you!" She looked at him softly, and her blue eyes fell; and then she spoke submissively.
"Now don't pretend to say it; you must not pretend to say it—unless you are quite certain. Shall I tell you why?"
"I say it a thousand times, and I will spend my life in saying it. You know it as well as I do. Certain indeed! But tell me why?"
"Only that I should feel it very much indeed, if I were not sure that it is perfectly true."
There were tears on her cheeks—the true playground of smiles; neither did they look out of place, for there was not much sorrow in them.
To reassure herself, she whispered something altogether repugnant to the spirit of the Stock Exchange, silver, and gold, and even jewels. But that blessed stockbroker knew the quickest way to close transactions. He swept back a mint-worth of ductile gold from the sapphires whose lustre was tremulous with dew, and he gazed at them gently, tenderly, triumphantly, yet not without fear and diffidence. "All this committed to my charge?" he asked, with the other arm defining the flexuous circuit of his future realm.
"It may be a very poor investment," answered Grace; "but one thing is certain—what little there is, is entirely a genuine article."