I know it. And I know another thing: and that is you were doing your
best to make them jealous."
Bessie laughed delightedly as at a compliment: "I leave one of them to
you. Try to get him into a better frame of mind before I come back," she
said, and turned to run downstairs.
Deleah leaned over the railing of the tiny landing, lit by a single
gas-jet above her head, to watch her go. She liked to see Bessie
good-tempered and in good spirits, and if to believe that every man she
knew was in love with her made her so, Deleah was willing to humour her.
About the devotion of young Forcus for Bessie she had her doubts, but that
of the lodger she took as a matter of course.
He was still seated at the table when she returned to him; the
bread-and-butter she had cut for him untouched on his plate, his tea
untasted.
"I thought perhaps you were not coming back," he said. He sighed, as if
relieved from an anxiety which had been painful. "Miss Deleah, I wish very
much to speak to you."
There were a few things in the matter of deportment he had learnt since
living over the grocer's shop; one was that a man must not sit while a
lady is standing. So he stood up in his place now, and waited till she had
taken hers again behind the tea-urn.
Pages:
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181
182
183
184