“Oh, goodness me! Clare, my love, the dear boy is there! Yes, come in, Edgar, if you don’t mind---- But I ought to call you Mr. Arden now. I never shall be able to call you Mr. Arden. Oh, goodness, boy! Well, there can’t be any harm in his kissing me; do you think there can be any harm in it, Clare? I am old enough to be both your mothers, and I am sure I think I love you quite as well. Of course, I should never speak of loving a gentleman if it was not for my age and lying here so helpless. Yes, I do feel as if I should cry sometimes to think how I used to run about once. But so long as it is only me, you know, and nobody else suffers---- And you are both looking so well! But tell me now how shall you put up with Arden after the Continent and all that? I never was on the Continent but once, and then it was nothing but a series of fétes, as they called them. I was saying to my brother only last night----; for you know you never would visit the Pimpernels, Clare----” “Who are the Pimpernels? and what have they to do with it?” said Edgar. “But tell me about yourself first, and how you come to be on a sofa. I never remember to have seen you sitting still before all my life.” “No, indeed,” said Miss Somers, her soft pretty old face growing suddenly grey and solemn, “that is what makes old Mercy think, it’s a judgment; but you wouldn’t say it was wicked to be always running about, would you now? It’s wrong to follow one’s own inclinations, to be sure, but so long as you don’t harm anybody---- There are the Pimpernel girls, who play croquet, from morning till night--not that I mean it’s wicked to play croquet--but poor Mr. Denbigh gets just a little led away I fear sometimes; and if ever there was a game intended for the waste of young people’s time----” “Never mind the Pimpernels,” said Clare, with a slightly imperative note in her voice. “It is Edgar who is here beside you now.” “Oh, yes--dear fellow; but do you know I think my mind is weakened as well as my body? Do I run on different from what I used, Edgar? I was talking to my brother the other night--and he busy with his paper--and ‘how you run on!’ was all he said when I asked him---- You know he might have given me a civil answer. I fear there is no doubt I am weakened, my dear. I was speaking to young Mr. Denbigh yesterday, and he says he said to the Doctor that if he were him he would take me to some baths or other, which did him a great deal of good, he says; but I could not take him away, you know, nor give anybody so much trouble. He is such a nice young man, Edgar. I should like you to know him. But, then, to think when I ask just a quiet question, ‘how you do run on!’ he said. Not that I am complaining of him, dear----” “Of young Mr. Denbigh?” said Clare.