"All right, David!" he said, patronizing me as indulgently as ever. "Mistress has had her good sleep and her nice breakfast, and she looks lovely. Go in, and see her—go in!"
I thought myself that she looked perhaps a little worn, and certainly thinner than when I had seen her last. But these were trifles. It is not easy to describe the sense of relief and pleasure that I felt—after having been accustomed to the sleepy eyes and serpentine graces of Madame Fontaine—when I looked again at the lithe active figure and the bright well-opened gray eyes of my dear little English aunt.
"Tell me, David," she began, as soon as the first greetings were over, "what do you think of Jack Straw? Was my poor dear husband not right? and have I not done well to prove it?"
I could, and did, honestly congratulate her on the result of the visit to Bedlam.
"And now about the people here," she went on. "I find Fritz's father completely changed on the subject of Fritz's marriage. And when I ask what it means, I am told that Madame Fontaine has set everything right, in the most wonderful manner, by saving Mr. Keller's life. Is this true?"
"Quite true. What do you think of Madame Fontaine?"
"Ask me that, David, to-morrow or the next day. My head is muddled by traveling—I have not made up my mind yet."
"Have you seen Minna?"
"Seen her, and kissed her too! There's a girl after my own heart. I consider our scatter-brained friend Fritz to be the luckiest young fellow living."
"If Minna was not going to be married," I suggested, "she would just do for one of your young-lady clerks, wouldn't she?"