"Well, Miss Matilda is quite as good. . .better in one respect."
"What is that?"
"She's honest."
"And the other is not?"
"I should not call her dishonest; but it must be confessed, she's a little artful."
"Artful is she?—I saw she was giddy and vain—and now," he added, after a pause, "I can well believe she was artful too, but so excessively so as to assume au aspect of extreme simplicity and unguarded openness. Yes," continued he musingly, "that accounts for some little things that puzzled me a trifle before."
After that, he turned the conversation to more general subjects. He did not leave me till we had nearly reached the park-gates: he had certainly stepped a little out of his way to accompany me so far, for he now went back and disappeared down Moss-lane, the entrance of which we had passed some time before. Assuredly, I did not regret this circumstance: if sorrow had any place in my heart, it was that he was gone at last. . .that he was no longer walking by my side, and that short interval of delightful intercourse was at an end.
