"But you must think. I cannot decide, I have thought of five hundred things already."
"Well, Laura,—what do you say?" said he.
"I think a silver salver would be pretty, and useful, too."
"Pretty and useful. Then let it be a silver salver, and be done with it," said he.
This notion of being "done with it" is so mannish! Here was my Gordian knot cut at once! However, there was no help for it,—though now, more than ever, since there was no danger of a duplicate, did I long for the fifty thousand different beautiful things the fifty dollars would buy.
Circumstances aided us, too, in coming to a conclusion. I was rather tired of rocking on these billows of uncertainty, even with the chance of plucking gems from the depths. And Mrs. Harris was coming the next day to tea, and to go away early to see Piccolomini sing and sparkle.
When we sat down that next day at the table, I poured the tea into a cup, and placed it on the prettiest little silver tray, and Polly handed it to Mrs. Harris as if she had done that particular thing all her life.
"Beautiful!" said Mrs. Harris, as it sparkled along back; "one of your wedding-gifts?"
"Yes," I answered, carelessly,—"Aunt Allen's."
So much was well got over. My hope was that Mrs. Harris, who talked well, and was never weary of that sort of well-doing, would keep on her own subjects of interest, to the exclusion of mine. Therefore, when she said pleasantly, en passant,—