"It was a matter of course," said Bell. "It always is right in the
novels. That's why I don't like them. They are too sweet."
"That's why I do like them, because they are so sweet. A sermon is
not to tell you what you are, but what you ought to be, and a novel
should tell you not what you are to get, but what you'd like to get."
"If so, then, I'd go back to the old school, and have the heroine
really a heroine, walking all the way up from Edinburgh to London,
and falling among thieves; or else nursing a wounded hero, and
describing the battle from the window. We've got tired of that; or
else the people who write can't do it nowadays. But if we are to have
real life, let it be real."
"No, Bell, no," said Lily. "Real life sometimes is so painful." Then
her sister, in a moment, was down on the floor at her feet, kissing
her hand and caressing her knees, and praying that the wound might be
healed.
On that morning Lily had succeeded in inducing her sister to tell
her all that had been said by Dr Crofts. All that had been said by
herself also, Bell had intended to tell; but when she came to this
part of the story, her account was very lame.
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