'Perhaps he was looking for
Gilbert.'
'No,' said Lucy, looking up from her work, with a slight blush, and
demure voice of secret importance; 'he had only stepped in for a
minute, to bring me a new fern.'
'Indeed,' said her father; 'I was not aware that he took interest in
your fernery.'
'He knows everything about ferns,' said Lucy. 'Mrs. Cavendish
Dusautoy once had a conservatory filled with the rarest specimens,
and he has given me a great many directions how to manage them.'
'Oh! if he could get you to listen to his maxims, I don't wonder at
anything,' exclaimed Albinia.
'He had only just come in with the Adiantium, and was telling me how
hydraulic power directed a stream of water near the roots among his
mother's Fuci,' said Lucy, rather hurt. 'He had fastened up his
horse quite securely, and nobody could have guessed that Maurice
could have opened that gate to cross the bridge, far less have
climbed up the rail to the horse's back. I never shall forget my
fright, when we heard the creature's feet, and Mr. Cavendish Dusautoy
began to run after it directly.'
'As foolish a thing as he could have done,' said Mr. Kendal, not
impressed with Mr. Cavendish Dusautoy's condescension in giving
chase. 'It was well poor little Maurice was not abandoned to your
discretion, and his resources.'
'It seems,' continued Mr. Ferrars, 'that young O'More was taking a
walk on the towing-path, and was just so far off as to see, without
being able to prevent it, this little monkey scramble from the gate
upon the horse's neck.
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