"If uncle chooses to fix the time of our destination at so unreasonably early an hour, he must care very little whether I come or not, and therefore is not likely to feel much distress one way or the other, and as aunt quite seconded him, she, of course, thinks the same."
"But, Lotty, you know that everybody who can manage it sets off as early as that, or sooner, when they have a long drive before them; besides, the principal point is to secure a good long day at Rathfelder's. However, I must not waste time in talking, but run and get everything as forward as circumstances will admit of."
"Pray do; it will be quite a relief to be rid of you in your present worrying mood," replied Charlotte, coldly.
I had an uncomfortable misgiving in my heart that Charlotte's more than indifference to the expedition, together with her unhappy fit of ill-humour (which, to do her justice, was not a kind of temper of frequent occurrence in her), would unite in rendering her so careless about coming that the carriage would be at the door before she had even quitted the breakfast-table. So I hurried up stairs and ran to lay the case, with as much consideration for Lotty as it admitted of, before our kind old nurse and good, sensible friend, Susan Bridget.
CHAPTER III.
A truly worthy old body was our nurse, Susan Bridget. Stern and hard of visage, firm and determined in disposition and of unpolished though perfectly respectful manners, she was nevertheless peculiarly sweet tempered, and possessed as kind a heart as ever beat within woman's breast. She had been our nurse from the period of our first becoming inmates of Fern Bank, and each year that passed her simple piety, fidelity and unaffected good sense raised her higher and higher in uncle and aunt's esteem. Although not exactly adapted to the position of lady's maid, aunt would not dismiss her as we grew older, feeling secure that in her was united to the duties of an orderly, industrious servant the true thoughtful care and anxiety of a Christian friend, and that she was, therefore, well fitted for an attendant upon two growing up, motherless girls like ourselves. Susan was certainly an old-fashioned and not always very grammatical speaker, but that seemed, I always thought, to enhance yet more the spirit and truth of her admonitions, of which she was very unsparing toward her nurslings when she considered them needed. I liked her quaint matter-of-fact mode of speech far better than many a more elegant style, for it brought her directly to the point with a kind of rough eloquence that at once struck at the understanding, leaving the delinquent no excuse to stand upon. She was quick and just in her perception of character, and altogether peculiarly fitted to deal with so capricious and whimsical a young damsel as dear, humoursome Charlotte. To say the truth, too, the latter, if she did not entertain more respect for the opinions and scoldings of nurse Susan, as she continued to be called, was greatly more afraid of her than of our gentle and kind guardians.
"I can't think, not I, why it is Miss Lotty will be always so contrary in her ways!" Susan exclaimed after listening with a disapproving face to my modified account of the morning's contretemps; "what's the good of it? can she tell me that? She gains nothing and loses a deal; she spoils the pleasure to herself of almost everything she does by her whimsies and silly tempers, and makes other folks uncomfortable too. She doesn't see how ugly and unpleasant it makes her in the eyes of her fellow-creatures, spoiling her looks and her manners, but more and worse than that, how sinful it makes her in the sight of God."
"I am so afraid," interposed I, "that she does not intend going at all to-day, Susan."