Love Me Little, Love Me Long | Page 5

point scarf, and see how it would look, would you? We need not cut the lace, dear; we could tack it on again the next morning; you are not so particular as I am--you look well in anything."
Lucy was soon seated denuding herself and embellishing her aunt. The latter reclined with grace, and furthered the work by smile and gesture.
"You don't ask me about the skirmish in the nursery."
"Their squabbles bore me, dear; but you can tell me who was the most in fault, if you think it worth while."
"Reginald, then, I am afraid; but it is not the poor boy; it is the influence of the stable-yard; and I do advise and entreat you to keep him out of it."
"Impossible, my dear; you don't know boys. The stable is their paradise. When he grows older his father must interfere; meantime, let us talk of something more agreeable."
"Yes; you shall go on with your story. You had got to his look of despair when your papa came in that morning."
"Oh, I have no time for anybody's despair just now; I can think of nothing but this detestable gown. Lucy, I suspect I almost wish I had made them put another breadth into the skirt."
"Luncheon, ma'am."
Lucy begged her aunt to go down alone; she would stay and work.
"No, you must come to luncheon; there is a dish on purpose for you--stewed eels."
"Eels; why, I abhor them; I think they are water-serpents."
"Who is it that is so fond of them, then?"
"It is you, aunt."
"So it is. I thought it had been you. Come, you must come down, whether you eat anything or not. I like somebody to talk to me while I am eating, and I had an idea just now--it is gone--but perhaps it will come back to me: it was about this abominable gown. O! how I wish there was not such a thing as dress in the world!!!"
While Mrs. Bazalgette was munching water-snakes with delicate zeal, and Lucy nibbling cake, came a letter. Mrs. Bazalgette read it with heightening color, laid it down, cast a pitying glance on Lucy, and said, with a sigh, "Poor girl!"
Lucy turned a little pale. "Has anything happened?" she faltered.
"Something is going to happen; you are to be torn away from here, where you are so happy--where we all love you, dear. It is from that selfish old bachelor. Listen: 'Dear madam, my niece Lucy has been due here three days. I have waited to see whether you would part with her without being dunned. My curiosity on that point is satisfied, and I have now only my affection to consult, which I do by requesting you to put her and her maid into a carriage that will be waiting for her at your door twenty-four hours after you receive this note. I have the honor to be, madam,' an old brute!!"
"And you can smile; but that is you all over; you don't care a straw whether you are happy or miserable."
"Don't I?"
"Not you; you will leave this, where you are a little queen, and go and bury yourself three months with that old bachelor, and nobody will ever gather from your face that you are bored to death; and here we are asked to the Cavendishes' next Wednesday, and the Hunts' ball on Friday--you are such a lucky girl--our best invitations always drop in while you are with us--we go out three times as often during your months as at other times; it is your good fortune, or the weather, or something."
"Dear aunt, this was your own arrangement with Uncle Fountain. I used to be six months with each in turn till you insisted on its being three. You make me almost laugh, both you and Uncle Fountain; what do you see in me worth quarreling for?"
"I will tell you what he sees--a good little spiritless thing--"
"I am larger than you, dear."
"Yes, in body--that he can make a slave of--always ready to nurse him and his foe, or to put down your work and to take up his--to play at his vile backgammon."
"Piquet, please."
"Where is the difference?--to share his desolation, and take half his blue devils on your own shoulders, till he will hyp you so that to get away you will consent to marry into his set--the county set--some beggarly old family that came down from the Conquest, and has been going down ever since; so then he will let you fly--with a string: you must vegetate two miles from him; so then he can have you in to Backquette and write his letters: he will settle four hundred a year on you, and you will be miserable for life."
"Poor Uncle Fountain, what a schemer he turns out!"
"Men all turn out schemers when you know them, Miss Impertinence. Well, dear, I have