“Yes. On any conditions, mamma, I should like to stay with you.” “Agreed, then, my dear!” said Lady Delacour. “Now let us go to the gold fishes, and see them eat lemna, or whatever you please to call it.” While they were looking at the gold fishes, the old man, who had been desired by Miss Portman to call, arrived. “Who is this fine, gray-haired old man?” said Lady Delacour. Helena, who did not know the share which Belinda’s aunt and her own mother had in the transaction, began with great eagerness to tell the history of the poor gardener, who had been cheated by some fine ladies out of his aloe, &c. She then related how kind Lady Anne Percival and her Aunt Margaret had been to him; that they had gotten him a place as a gardener at Twickenham; and that he had pleased the family to whom he was recommended so much by his good behaviour, that, as they were leaving their house, and obliged to part with him, they had given him all the geraniums and balsams out of the green-house of which he had the care, and these he had been this day selling to the young ladies at Mrs. Dumont’s. “I received the money for him, and I was just going to pay him,” said Helena, “when Miss Portman came; and that put every thing else out of my head. May I go and give him his money now, mamma?” “He can wait a few minutes,” said Lady Delacour, who had listened to this story with much embarrassment and impatience. “Before you go, Helena, favour us with the names of _the fine ladies who cheated_ this old gardener out of his aloe.” “Indeed, mamma, I don’t know their names.” “No!--Did you never ask Lady Anne Percival, or your aunt Margaret?--Look in my face, child! Did they never inform you?” “No, ma’am, never. I once asked Lady Anne, and she said that she did not choose to tell me; that it would be of no use to me to know.” “I give Lady Anne Percival more credit and more thanks for this,” cried Lady Delacour, “than for all the rest. I see she has not attempted to lower me in my child’s opinion. I am the fine lady, Helena--I was the cause of his being cheated--I was intent upon _the noble end_ of outshining a certain Mrs. Luttridge--the _noble means_ I left to others, and the means have proved worthy of the end. I deserve to be brought to shame for my folly; yet my being ashamed will do nobody any good but myself. Restitution is in these cases the best proof of repentance. Go, Helena, my love! settle your little affairs with this old man, and bid him call here again to-morrow. I will see what we can do for him.” Lord Delacour had this very morning sent home to her ladyship a handsome diamond ring, which had been intended as a present for Mrs. Luttridge, and which he imagined would therefore be peculiarly acceptable to his lady. In the evening, when his lordship asked her how she liked the ring, which he desired the jeweller to leave for her to look at it, she answered, that it was a handsome ring, but that she hoped he had not purchased it for her.