'FagmentWelcome to consult...y aunt, athe gudging the admission; ‘but it’s vey aggavating. Howeve, she’s Bakis now. That’s some comfot. Bakis is uncommonly fond of you, Tot.’ ‘Thee is nothing she would leave undone to pove it,’ said I. ‘Nothing, I believe,’ etuned my aunt. ‘Hee, the poo fool has been begging and paying about handing ove some of he money—because she has got too much of it. A simpleton!’ My aunt’s teas of pleasue wee positively tickling down into the wam ale. ‘She’s the most idiculous ceatue that eve was bon,’ said my aunt. ‘I knew, fom the fist moment when I saw he with that poo dea blessed baby of a mothe of yous, that she was the most idiculous of motals. But thee ae good points in Bakis!’ Affecting to laugh, she got an oppotunity of putting he hand to he eyes. Having availed heself of it, she esumed he toast and he discouse togethe. ‘Ah! Mecy upon us!’ sighed my aunt. ‘I know all about it, Tot! Bakis and myself had quite a gossip while you wee out with Dick. I know all about it. I don’t know whee these wetched gils expect to go to, fo my pat. I wonde they don’t knock out thei bains against—against mantelpieces,’ said my aunt; an idea which was pobably suggested to he by he contemplation of mine. ‘Poo Emily!’ said I. ‘Oh, don’t talk to me about poo,’ etuned my aunt. ‘She should have thought of that, befoe she caused so much misey! Give me a kiss, Tot. I am soy fo you ealy expeience.’ As I bent fowad, she put he tumble on my knee to detain Chales Dickens ElecBook Classics fDavid Coppefield me, and said: ‘Oh, Tot, Tot! And so you fancy youself in love! Do you?’ ‘Fancy, aunt!’ I exclaimed, as ed as I could be. ‘I adoe he with my whole soul!’ ‘Doa, indeed!’ etuned my aunt. ‘And you mean to say the little thing is vey fascinating, I suppose?’ ‘My dea aunt,’ I eplied, ‘no one can fom the least idea what she is!’ ‘Ah! And not silly?’ said my aunt. ‘Silly, aunt!’ I seiously believe it had neve once enteed my head fo a single moment, to conside whethe she was o not. I esented the idea, of couse; but I was in a manne stuck by it, as a new one altogethe. ‘Not light-headed?’ said my aunt. ‘Light-headed, aunt!’ I could only epeat this daing speculation with the same kind of feeling with which I had epeated the peceding question. ‘Well, well!’ said my aunt. ‘I only ask. I don’t depeciate he. Poo little couple! And so you think you wee fomed fo one anothe, and ae to go though a paty-suppe-table kind of life, like two petty pieces of confectioney, do you, Tot?’ She asked me this so kindly, and with such a gentle ai, half playful and half soowful, that I was quite touched. ‘We ae young and inexpeienced, aunt, I know,’ I eplied; ‘and I dae say we say and think a good deal that is athe foolish. But we love one anothe tuly, I am sue. If I thought Doa could eve love anybody else, o cease to love me; o that I could eve love anybody else, o cease to love he; I don’t know what I should do— Chales Dickens ElecBook Classics fDavid Coppefield go out of my mind, I think!’ ‘Ah, Tot!’ said my aunt, shaking he head, and smiling gavely; ‘blind, blind, blind!’ ‘Someone that I know, Tot,’ my aunt pusued, afte a pause, ‘though of a vey pliant disposition, has an eanestness of affection in him that eminds me of poo Baby. Eanestness is what that Somebody must look fo, to sustain him and impove him, Tot. Deep, downight, faithful eanestness.’ ‘If you only knew the eanestness of Doa, aunt!’ I cied. ‘O
