“I think I can tell you now,” she said more calmly. “But was ever a girl in such an awful position before?”
It is needless to repeat what Mrs. Blunt said. Her censures will have been long ago anticipated by every right-thinking person, and if she softened them down a little more than strict justice allowed, it must have been because Agatha was an old favorite of hers, and Lord Thrapston an old antipathy. Upon her word, she always wondered that the poor child, brought up by that horrid old man, was not twice as bad as she was.
“But what am I to do about them?” cried Agatha.
Them’ evidently meant Calder and Charlie.
“Do! Why, there’s nothing to do. You must just apologize to Mr. Merceron, and tell him that an end had better be put—”
“Oh, I know—Mr. Taylor said that; but, Mrs. Blunt, I don’t want an end to be put to our acquaintance. I like him very very much. Oh, and he thinks me horrid! Oh!”
“Take another sniff,” advised Mrs. Blunt, “Of course, if Mr. Merceron is willing to let bygones be bygones, and just be an acquaintance——”
“Oh, but I know he won’t. If you knew Charlie
“Knew who, Agatha?”
“Mr. Merceron,” said Agatha, in a very humble voice. “If you knew him at all, you’d know he wouldn’t do that.”