'How very good! I met him in the street just now. Really, he is the kindest old gentleman in the world!'
'I believe you dazzled him, Mettie; he says he did not know you till you spoke to him, and if he had realised what a beautiful and majestic young lady you were, he should hardly have ventured to propose your taking up your abode under his humble roof.'
'That must be the effect of living with Alda,' said Wilmet merrily; 'but, oh! I am glad to be at home again!'
'And I never was so glad of anything in my life,' said Geraldine eagerly.
'I am longing to go over the house, and know what to do about furniture,' continued Wilmet.
'There! now W. W. is herself again!' said Felix.
'Mrs. Froggatt came and called on me,' said Geraldine. 'She talked of leaving us the larger things that will not go into the cottage.'
'Which is well,' said Felix; 'for how much of ours will survive the shock of removing is doubtful.'
'All the things that came from Vale Leston are quite solid,' said Wilmet, bristling up.
'That carpet is solid darn,' said Felix. 'We tried one evening, and found that though the pattern of rose-leaves is a tradition, no one younger than Clem could remember having seen either design or colour.'
'You should not laugh at it, Felix,' said Wilmet, a little hurt; for indeed her mother's needle and her own were too well acquainted with the carpet for her to like to hear it contemned.
Felix and Cherry both felt somewhat called to order, as if their mistress had come home again; and Cherry was the first to break silence by inquiring after Wilmet's studies at Brighton.
'Oh yes,' said Wilmet, 'I do hope I am improved. That was all Marilda's kindness. She quite understood how I missed everybody and everything; and at last, one day, when I was wishing I could pronounce German like Alda, and that Alda had time to give me some lessons--'
'Oh, you don't know how useful she is! She writes all the notes. Marilda devised getting this Fraulein--such a good-natured woman! and when she heard what I wanted, she got leave for me to come every day to study the working of the school. I do believe I shall teach much better now, if only I were not so ignorant. I never had any notion before how little I knew!'