Part 36 (2/2)
”Do give me a few more rum ideas then. I want to see everything of that sort. I'm going to Hampton Court and to Windsor and to the Dulwich Gallery.”
He seemed greatly amused. ”I wonder you don't go to Rosherville Gardens.”
Bessie yearned. ”Are they interesting?”
”Oh wonderful!”
”Are they weirdly old? That's all I care for,” she said.
”They're tremendously old; they're all falling to ruins.”
The girl rose to it. ”I think there's nothing so charming as an old ruinous garden. We must certainly go there.”
Her friend broke out into mirth. ”I say, Woodley, here's Miss Alden wants to go down to Rosherville Gardens! Hang it, they _are_ 'weird'!”
Willie Woodley looked a little blank; he was caught in the fact of ignorance of an apparently conspicuous feature of London life. But in a moment he turned it off. ”Very well,” he said, ”I'll write for a permit.”
Lord Lambeth's exhilaration increased. ”'Gad, I believe that, to get your money's worth over here, you Americans would go anywhere!”
”We wish to go to Parliament,” said Bessie. ”That's one of the first things.”
”Ah, it would bore you to death!” he returned.
”We wish to hear you speak.”
”I never speak-except to young ladies.”
She looked at him from under the shade of her parasol. ”You're very strange,” she then quietly concluded. ”I don't think I approve of you.”
”Ah, now don't be severe, Miss Alden!” he cried with the note of sincerity. ”Please don't be severe. I want you to like me-awfully.”
”To like you awfully? You mustn't laugh at me then when I make mistakes.
I regard it as my right-as a free-born American-to make as many mistakes as I choose.”
”Upon my word I didn't laugh at you,” the young man pleaded.
”And not only that,” Bessie went on; ”but I hold that all my mistakes should be set down to my credit. You must think the better of me for them.”
”I can't think better of you than I do,” he declared.
Again, shadily, she took him in. ”You certainly speak very well to young ladies. But why don't you address the House?-isn't that what they call it?”
”Because I've nothing to say.”
”Haven't you a great position?” she demanded.
He looked a moment at the back of his glove. ”I'll set that down as one of your mistakes-to your credit.” And as if he disliked talking about his position he changed the subject. ”I wish you'd let me go with you to the Tower and to Hampton Court and to all those other places.”
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