That evening, up in the sick room it was quite evening, and all the others of the family were taking rest, or keeping Mr. Rossitur company down stairs Fleda was carefully roasting some of the same oysters for Hugh's supper. She had spread out a glowing bed of coals on the hearth, and there lay four or five of the big bivalves, snapping and sputtering in approbation of their quarters, in a most comfortable manner; and Fleda, standing before the fire, tended them with a double kind of pleasure. From one friend, and for another, those were most odorous oysters. Hugh sat watching them and her, the same in happy simplicity that he had been at eleven years old.
"How pleasant those oysters smell!" said he. "Fleda, they remind me so of the time when you and I used to roast oysters in Mrs. Renney's room for lunch do you recollect? and sometimes in the evening, when everybody was gone out, you know; and what an airing we used to have to give the dining- room afterwards. How we used to enjoy them, Fleda you and I, all alone."
"Yes," said Fleda, in a tone of doubtful enjoyment. She was shielding her face with a paper, and making self-sacrificing efforts to persuade a large oyster-shell to stand so on the coals as to keep the juice.
"Don't," said Hugh; "I would rather the oysters should burn than you. Mr. Carleton wouldn't thank me for letting you do so."
"Never mind," said Fleda, arranging the oysters to her satisfaction; "he isn't here to see. Now, Hugh, my dear, these are ready as soon as I am."
"I am ready," said Hugh. "How long it is since we had a roast oyster, Fleda!"
"They look good, don't they?"
A little stand was brought up between them, with the bread- and-butter and the cups; and Fleda opened oysters and prepared tea for Hugh, with her nicest, gentlest, busiest of hands making every bit to be twice as sweet, for her sympathizing eyes and loving smile and pleasant word commenting. She shared the meal with him, but her own part was as slender as his, and much less thought of. His enjoyment was what she enjoyed, though it was with a sad twinge of alloy, which changed her face whenever it was where he could not see it: when turned upon him, it was only bright and affectionate, and sometimes a little too tender; but Fleda was too good a nurse to let that often appear.
"Mr. Carleton did not bargain for your opening his oysters,
Fleda. How kind it was of him to send them!"
"Yes."