“How, dangerous?” asked Mary.
“Shipwrecks?” suggested Alice, nodding towards The River with a smile.
“Yes,” replied he, stooping down and kissing them both with impartial cordiality,—“shipwrecks of hearts.”
“I have lost mine already,” said Alice, laying her head on his shoulder and shutting her eyes, with a languishing smile on her upturned face.
“Little hypocrite!” said he, patting her cheek.
“Only a pat for such a speech?”
“Well, there! So, Alice, your grandmother consented to let us have you this Christmas? It was but right, now that you are grown. And then she lives in such an out-of-the-way neighborhood.”
“Yes, it was very kind in grandmamma to let me come here instead of spending my Christmas with her. She grows deafer every year, and I think—perhaps—I was going to make such a wicked speech!” And Alice dropped her eyes.
“What dreadful thing were you going to say?”
“I was thinking that, perhaps, bawling into one’s grandmother’s ear was not so pleasant a pastime, to a girl, as having—just for a change you know—a young fellow whispering in hers.”