She bustled in and found him standing in a rapture, with the blood mantling in his pale cheeks, and his dark eyes glowing.
"Now blessed be the heart that hath conceived this thing, and the hand that hath done it," said he. "My poor room, it is a bower of roses, all beauty and fragrance."
And he sat down, inhaling them and looking at them; and a dreamy, tender complacency crept over his heart, and softened his noble features exquisitely.
Widow Gough, red with gratified pride, stood watching him, and admiring him; but, indeed, she often admired him, though she had got into a way of decrying him.
But at last she lost patience at his want of curiosity; that being a defect she was free from herself.
"Ye don't ask me who sent them," said she, reproachfully.
"Nay, nay," said he; "prithee do not tell me: let me divine."
"Divine, then," said Betty, roughly. "Which I suppose you means 'guess.'"
"Nay, but let me be quiet awhile," said he, imploringly; "let me sit down and fancy that I am a holy man, and some angel hath turned my cave into a Paradise."
"No more an angel than I am," said the practical widow. "But, now I think on 't, y' are not to know who 't was. Them as sent them they bade me hold my tongue."