"
"I'm nursing dear Eustace," said Jane.
Mrs. Hignett quivered, and cast an eye on the hump in the bed-clothes
which represented dear Eustace. A cold fear had come upon her.
"'Dear Eustace'!" she repeated mechanically.
"We're engaged," said Jane. "We got engaged this morning. That's how he
sprained his ankle. When I accepted him, he tried to jump a holly-bush."
"Engaged! Eustace, is this true?"
"Yes," said a muffled voice from the interior of the bed.
"And poor Eustace is so worried," continued Jane, "about the house."
She went on quickly. "He doesn't want to deprive you of it, because he
knows what it means to you. So he is hoping--we are both hoping--that
you will accept it as a present when we are married. We really shan't
want it, you know. We are going to live in London. So you will take it,
won't you--to please us?"
We all of us, even the greatest of us, have our moments of weakness.
Let us then not express any surprise at the sudden collapse of one of
the world's greatest female thinkers.
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