‘You want a great deal, Mr Langham,’ she said, keeping her eyes turned away from me.
‘Do I want too much—more than you can give me?’—Silence for a few moments.—‘Answer me, May. I must know the truth, whether it is good or bad. Do I ask for more than you can give me?’
Another pause, a short one; then came the sweetest whisper I had ever heard: ‘No;’ and I am afraid the vicar of St Barnabas had two very inattentive listeners that evening.
What days of planning and projecting followed! We meant to be very prudent and do nothing rashly. Marriage was impossible at present; but some day, in two or three years, when my salary should reach the princely sum of a hundred and fifty pounds a year, we would form a little home, and Gerald would live with us. Meanwhile, the most rigorous economy was to be observed; every penny saved brought that little home a shade nearer.
Mrs Bowden soon found out what was meant by the tiny pearl ring on May’s finger, and proved a most sympathetic confidant. ‘But I don’t mean to alter my will in your favour, remember,’ she said to my darling in her sharp abrupt way. ‘That would be too much bother; and besides, my property will fall into the hands of a good man who will not fail to provide for you.’
May thought of Mr George Bowden, and mentally doubted the accuracy of this last statement. She made no remark, but Mrs Bowden guessed the tenor of her thoughts.
‘You don’t agree with me, I see,’ she said; ‘but you’ll find out that I have said too little of his care for you.—But you must not leave me, child. I have grown to love you, and I shall not need your service long.’
‘You don’t feel worse, I hope, dear Mrs Bowden?’
‘Worse or better, little May, as you choose to read the meaning of the words, but assuredly not far from the end. And since it is so, you will, I think, gratify a caprice of mine. I want to see your lover. Ask him to come up some evening, and let me have a few minutes’ conversation with him.’
Of course I went. Gerald had occasionally gone to see his sister; but hitherto I had had no right to cross the portal of Mrs Bowden’s house, and I was not without some curiosity to see the amiable ogress who was May’s mistress. My first impression was a confused one of having seen her before—long ago, when she was younger and more gentle than now; but I could in nowise affix either date or place to the memory. It was vague, yet ineffaceable. Our conversation was eccentric to the point of discourtesy.