Page 479 - sons-and-lovers

The old lady at whose house they had tea was roused into
gaiety by them.
‘I could wish you’d had something of a better day,’ she
said, hovering round.
‘Nay!’ he laughed. ‘We’ve been saying how nice it is.’
The old lady looked at him curiously. There was a pe-
culiar glow and charm about him. His eyes were dark and
laughing. He rubbed his moustache with a glad movement.
‘Have you been saying SO!’ she exclaimed, a light rous-
ing in her old eyes.
‘Truly!’ he laughed.
‘Then I’m sure the day’s good enough,’ said the old lady.
She fussed about, and did not want to leave them.
‘I don’t know whether you’d like some radishes as well,’
she said to Clara; ‘but I’ve got some in the garden—AND a
cucumber.’
Clara flushed. She looked very handsome.
‘I should like some radishes,’ she answered.
And the old lady pottered off gleefully.
‘If she knew!’ said Clara quietly to him.
‘Well, she doesn’t know; and it shows we’re nice in our-
selves, at any rate. You look quite enough to satisfy an
archangel, and I’m sure I feel harmless—so—if it makes
you look nice, and makes folk happy when they have us,
and makes us happy—why, we’re not cheating them out of
much!’
They went on with the meal. When they were going
away, the old lady came timidly with three tiny dahlias in
full blow, neat as bees, and speckled scarlet and white. She

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