‘They must have had their first talk out, and perhaps he will want something,’ Mary said to herself after a while, and was turning to go in, when Ben met her,--coming to look for her, he said. It was Mrs. Renton’s time for her sleep, and he had settled her pillows for her, and Mary was to have a holiday for once.
‘We are to leave her alone for an hour or two,’ said Ben; ‘and, Mary, you must tell me all about her. You have been doing our duty while we have been,--pleasing ourselves. I have behaved like a brute to my poor mother.’
‘Oh, no,’ said Mary; ‘we have never thought so. You are not like,--the rest of us. I always understood how it was. You were waiting till you could come as you ought,--as you are. I would not write to you, Ben. I thought, perhaps, it was better you should not hear from any of us; but I felt how it was.’
This little speech, which came out of Mary’s very heart, and was founded upon utter conviction, struck Ben with the wildest perplexity. Could she know how he had in reality spent his time? Could she be mocking him? But a glance at her face made that idea impossible. Mary believed in him somehow, though he did not even guess why. It gave him a little uncomfortable thrill of self-consciousness; and, what was still more strange, it gave him just a momentary amusement; but, on the whole, perhaps its effect was encouraging, and set him at his ease with his new companion.
‘I have behaved like a brute,’ he said again; ‘though you, with your kind heart, make excuses for me; but, after all, it has been a little hard. A man cannot be twisted out of his socket and set into another without feeling it, Mary; though I do not dwell upon that now.’
‘Oh, I know,’ cried Mary, with all her heart; ‘and there has never been a day that I have not thought of you, Ben; but you have overcome it nobly,’ the girl cried in her enthusiasm, with tears in her eyes. Dear, little, soft, foolish creature!--what did she mean?
‘Put on your hat and come down with me to the river,’ said Ben. ‘My mother says you have no variety, nor even air. And she is to be left by herself till dinner. Come, and I will row you up to the Swan’s Nest. Do you remember?’
‘Do I remember!’ cried Mary, rushing into the house for her hat. Her heart beat as it had never beat before in its life. Ben to recollect the old story of the Swan’s Nest! It was natural that Laurie, her own playfellow, should think of all those childish follies,--but Ben! She came rushing out again, putting on her hat as she came, not to keep the prince waiting. If poor Mary had but known the use that had been made of her name six months before in Guildford Street, or why it was that her lordly cousin was so gracious to her now!