When they say a thing, they stick to it." "They used to, you mean," answered Jess with a shrug, and got up from her chair to go to bed.
Bessie began to fidget her white feet over one another.
"Stop a bit, Jess dear," she said.

"I want to speak to you about something else." Jess sat or rather dropped back into her chair, and her pale face turned paler than ever; but Bessie blushed very red and hesitated.
"It's about Captain Niel," she said at length.
"Oh," answered Jess with a little laugh, and her voice sounded cold and strange in her own ears.

"Has he been following Frank Muller's example, and proposing to you too ?" "No-o," said Bessie, "but"-- and here she rose, and, sitting on a stool by her elder sister's chair, rested her forehead against her knee--"but I love him, and I _believe_ that he loves me.

This morning he told me that I was the prettiest woman he had seen at home or abroad, and the sweetest too; and do you know," she said, looking up and giving a happy little laugh, "I think he meant it." "Are you joking, Bessie, or are you really in earnest ?" "In earnest! ah, but that I am, and I am not ashamed to say it.

I fell in love with John Niel when he killed that cock ostrich.