“Then it sounds like what I am! But will it be that all poor Evie did for her husband—when she saved his life, don’t you know,—will that have turned his heart to her again?”
“How sentimental we are becoming!” lightly. “No, I think not. Efforts of that kind might prove her own affection for her husband, but could hardly awaken his if it were dead.”
“Then will you tell me what it was that did, O wise young judge?”
“How can I say for certain? I can only suggest that Major Ambrose is convinced by this time that his wife is one of the happy people who never grow old——”
“He is that, indeed. Have I not heard him myself times without number cast it at her that she would never grow up?”
“I had not quite finished.—And perhaps he finds himself prizing, because they are hers, even those features in her character which he used to resent.”
“Cannot do without her—eh? But sure that’s a consequence, and I’m asking you for a cause, a reason, an explanation!”
“I’m afraid that’s all I can give you,” meekly.
“‘My wise little Sally!’” murmured Brian.
“That is a quotation—from Papa, ain’t it?” reprovingly.