"
"You'd talk High-Dutch, Nina, sooner than submit to that," said one of the
sisters.
The conclave was still sitting in full deliberation, when one of the maids
entered the room with a very long face. There was a gentleman in the
drawing-room asking for Miss Morris! Lucy, who at the moment was standing
at a table on which were spread an infinity of books, became at once as
white as a sheet. Her fast friend, Lydia Fawn, who was standing by her,
immediately took hold of her hand quite tightly. The face of the maid was
fit for a funeral. She knew that Miss Morris had had a "follower," that
the follower had come, and that then Miss Morris had gone away. Miss
Morris had been allowed to come back; and now, on the very first day, just
when my lady's back was turned, here was the follower again! Before she
had come up with her message, there had been an unanimous expression of
opinion in the kitchen that the fat would all be in the fire. Lucy was as
white as marble, and felt such a sudden shock at her heart, that she could
not speak. And yet she never doubted for a moment that Frank Greystock was
the man. And with what purpose but one could he have come there? She had
on the old, old frock in which, before her visit to Lady Linlithgow, she
used to pass the morning amid her labours with the girls, a pale, gray,
well-worn frock, to which must have been imparted some attraction from the
milliner's art, because everybody liked it so well, but which she had put
on this very morning as a testimony, to all the world around her, that she
had abandoned the idea of being anything except a governess.
Pages:
1151
1152
1153
1154
1155
1156
1157
1158
1159
1160
1161
1162
1163
1164
1165
1166
1167
1168
1169
1170
1171
1172
1173
1174
1175