Jennie, who knew nothing of Grey’s arrival, had visited with the servants, until she concluded it was time to return to her young mistress.  As she came within sight of the summer-house what was her horror to see a tall young man with his arms around Bessie, and, as it seemed to her, trying to take her from the chair.

“Thaves and murther!” she cried, “if there isn’t a spalpeen thryin’ to run away with Miss Bessie, body and bones;” and at her utmost speed she dashed on to the fray.

But at sight of Grey she stopped short, and with wide-open eyes and mouth, surveyed him a moment in astonishment; then a broad smile illumined her face as she exclaimed: 

“An’ faith that’s right.  Kiss her again as many times as ye likes.  It’s not meself will interfere, though if you’d been a bla’guard, as I thought you was, I’d of had yer heart’s blood,” and turning on her heel Jennie walked rapidly away, leaving the lovers a very little upset and disconcerted.

It was Grey who wheeled Bessie back to the house, and taking her in his arms carried her to his Aunt Lucy, to whom he said, as he put her down upon the couch: 

“This is my little wife, or, rather, she is to be my wife on Christmas Eve, and Christmas Day we are to spend here with you, who will make the old house brighter than ever it was before.”  Then, going up to Miss McPherson, he continued:  “Kiss me, Aunt Betsey because I am to be your nephew, and because I am no longer a fool.”

The kiss he asked for was given, and thus the engagement was sealed, and when next day Grey returned to Boston, he said to his Aunt Hannah, who was still with his mother: 

“Bessie is to be my wife, and I must tell her our secret, and at your house, too, for, after she has seen you, I feel sure that she will forgive everything.”

CHAPTER XIV.

TELLING BESSIE.

At last Mrs. Geraldine was better, and signified her willingness to let her sister-in-law return to her own home, from which she had been absent so long.  She had received, with a good deal of equanimity, the news of her son’s engagement with Bessie, whom she remembered as a lovely child, wholly unlike her mother.

“If that woman were living, I would never consent to the marriage,” she said; “but as it is, I am willing, though I had hoped that in your travels abroad you might have found some high-born English girl with a title, but it is something to marry a niece of Lady Jane, and I dare say Miss McPherson will make the girl her heir; so I will welcome her as my daughter, and perhaps she will brighten up the house, which is at times insufferably dull, with your father growing more and more silent and gloomy every day.  I should not wonder if he were to become crazy, like your grandfather.”