“Rich, John! How can you ask such goose’s questions?”

“Do you regret anything, my love?”

“Regret anything? No!” Bella confidently answered. But then, suddenly changing, she said, between laughing and glistening: “Oh yes, I do though. I regret Mrs. Boffin.”

“I, too, regret that separation very much. But perhaps it is only temporary. Perhaps things may so fall out, as that you may sometimes see her again⁠—as that we may sometimes see her again.” Bella might be very anxious on the subject, but she scarcely seemed so at the moment. With an absent air, she was investigating that button on her husband’s coat, when Pa came in to spend the evening.