"Oh! don't be frightened. I sha'n't bring you to disgrace about it. Made up my mind to that from the first. You needn't get mad and blush so; I ain't a genius, but I can make up stories in my head; and why not tell 'em to her? Why not, I say, when they please her? You should hear the elegant messages I bring from Mr. Lee, at least four times a day. When she gets a nice little dish for dinner, it gives her appetite to think he ordered it; but the cook knows."
"But, Lottie, this is wrong."
"Wrong! Well, I like that, Miss Hyde."
"It isn't the truth, Lottie."
"The truth! Who said it was? As if I didn't know it was lying, and glory in it!"
I could hardly keep my countenance. As for arguing a moral question with Lottie, the thought was too ridiculous. She had her own ideas, and kept to them without the slightest regard to those of other people.
While we were talking, Lottie had gradually edged herself out of the room, and her last speech was delivered on the platform of the terrace. Mrs. Lee's window was up, and I saw her husband enter the room with what seemed to me a reluctant step. He sat down, and opened a book, as if to read aloud. This had been his usual custom, but the last few evenings he had spent in the drawing-room. I would have taken his place, but she rejected my offer with one of those deep sighs that excite so much pity when they come from an invalid.
"You talk against fibs, Miss Hyde; now what do you think of that? She never would 'a' sent for him—died first, like a lamb starving in the cold. Hist! there comes Mrs. Babylon and her private beau."
True enough, Mrs. Dennison and Lawrence had passed through one of the drawing-room windows, and were slowly coming down the terrace platform, which, as I have said, ran around one end and the back of the house. It afforded a fine promenade, and they were enjoying the moonlight that fell upon it. My attention was occupied by them a moment, during which Lottie disappeared. The railing of this platform was lined with a rich shrubbery of hot-house plants, lemon-trees, tall roses, and such creeping vines as bear most choice blossoms. These cast heavy shadows, and I fancy that the girl disappeared among them,—listening, perhaps, being considered as one of the accomplishments which she devoted to the benefit of her mistress.