A lovely scene was it, and maddening to masculine imagination, when so many of Miss POTTS'S blooming young schoolmates kissed her good-bye in the porch, and gave her a last chance to tell them what he had written, then. It was charming to see that willed-away little creature, without her enamel, waving farewell to the stages departing for the ferry; and to hear the disappearing ones calling out to her: "By-bye, FLORA, dear; EDDY ought to see you now with your natural complexion." "Au revoir, Pet You'd better hurry in now; here comes a man!"
"Don't stay out in the sun for us, Darling, or the belladonna may lose its effect."
Oh, rosebud-garden of girls! Oh, fresh young blossoms, to which we of the male and cabbage growth are as cheap vegetables! Cling together while ye may in the fair bouquet of sweet school friendship, of musical parlor-sisterhood. So shall your thorns be known only to each other in such fragrant clustering, and never known at all to Men unless they insensately persist in giving you their hands.
While the Flowerpot was thus receiving fond good-byes, EDWIN DROOD, on his way to see her, suffered an indecision of purpose which might have bred disquiet in a more gigantic mind than his. With the package containing the memorial stay-lace in one pocket, and his hands in two others, he strode up the Bumsteadville turnpike in a light overcoat and a brown study. But for good Mr. DIBBLE'S undeniably truthful picture of a modern lover's actual situation, he might have allowed matters to go as they would, and sunk into an early marriage without one prayer to Heaven for mercy. Now, however, that picture troubled him even more than the bump which he had got upon his head from the tilting table in the lawyer's office, and he was disposed to send the stay-lace back to the candid old man. "FLORA and I have about equal intellects," reasoned he to himself. "Shall I leave the whole question to her, or my own decision! One would be about as profound in wisdom as the other. Which? I guess I'll toss-up for it."
He stepped aside from the road, under a leafless tree, and drew from a pocket a badly speckled nickel coin. "Heads for her, tails for me," he said, with some awe in his tone. The tasteful coin was tossed, and "Heads" stared up at him from the frozen ground. "It's her inning," he muttered, and, re-pocketing the money and his hands, went on whistling. Thus the great crises of our laborious human lives are settled by the idle inspiration of a moment, and fate, for good, or evil, comes as it is cent.
The Flowerpot, expecting him, was ready in her walking dress, and, by tacit permission of Miss CAROWTHERS, the two started upon a promenade for the nearest confidential cross-road, each eating half of an apple which Mr. DROOD had brought to disguise his feelings.
"My dear, absurd EDDY," said FLORA, when they had arrived in a secluded lane not far from St. Cow's Church, "I want to give you something very serious, and oh! I'm so ridiculously nervous about doing so,--especially after your giving me this apple."
"Never mind the apple, FLORA. It was the fruit of our First Parents, and has constituted the most available pie of the poor ever since. Don't allow it to fetter your freedom of speech, and please try to eat it without such a gashing noise."
"Thank you, EDDY. You have always been liberal with me. And now are you sure you won't be absurdly angry with me if I give you something?"
He fell away from her a moment, as half anticipating a kiss, but promised that he would restrain his temper.