Читать книгу Cousin Mary онлайн

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And as often as not, Mr. Asquith would meet her on the way—sometimes as she was going, sometimes coming; sometimes in the cottages, sometimes as she came out smiling, with her empty basket. Of course Mr. Asquith gave all the credit of what was in reality Mrs. Prescott’s kindness to her little niece. He thought this practical little girl, with her basket, acted on her own impulse, and that it was altogether out of the tenderness of her own heart that she remembered the little fancies of the sick. Most likely he thought that these little delicacies were saved from her own share of the good things at the Hall, and never made account of Mrs. Prescott at all in the matter; for nobody is quite just, as has been said, and Mrs. Prescott was stout and entirely uninteresting, and her under lip projected a little, so that people sometimes thought her cross and sometimes sulky. But Mary was as bright as the day, and the village people were all fond of her. “Oh, come in, sir,” they said at first, when he lingered at the door, seeing a lady in the room. “I will come again another day, Mrs. Williams, for I see you have a visitor already.” “Oh, bless you, sir, come in, come in; why it’s only Miss Mary,” the good woman would say, laughing with amused surprise at the thought that on such a consideration the curate should be shy and hold back.