Page:Life's little ironies (1894).pdf/208

“As soon as Tony came up to her she said, ‘My dear Tony, will you give me a lift home?”

“That I will, darling,’ said Tony. ‘You don’t suppose I could refuse ’ee ?”

“She smiled a smile, and up she hopped, and on drove Tony,

"'Tony, she says, in a sort of tender chide, ‘why did ye desert me for that other one? In what is she better than I? I should have made ‘ee a finer wife, and a more loving one, too, "Tisn’t girls that are so easily won at first that are the beat, Think how long we've known each other—ever since we were children almost—now haven’t we, Tony?

‘“Yes, that we have,’ says Tony, a-struck with the truth o’t.

"And you've never seen anything in me to complain of, have ye, Tony? Now tell the truth to me,’

“I never bave, upon my life,’ says Tony.

“'And—can you say I’m not pretty, Tony? Now look at me

“He let his eyes light upon her for a long while. ‘I really can’t,’ says he. ‘In fact, I never knowed you was so pretty before !’

"Prettier than she?"

“What Tony would have said to that nobody knows, for before he could speak, what should he see ahead, over the hedge past the tarning, but a feather he knew well-—the feather in Milly’s hat—she to whom he had been thinking of putting the question as to giving out the banns that very week.

“Unity,’ says he, as mild as he could, ‘ here’s Milly coming. Now I shall catch it mightily if she sees ’ee riding here with me; and if you get down she'll be turning the corner in a moment, and, seeing ’ee in the road, she'll know we've been coming on together. Now, dearest Unity, will ye, to avoid all unpleasant-