Heaven only knows where this child got her wits from, but if she had been drilled for a month she could not have acted the spirit of her part with greater cleverness. The words I did not teach her; I simply told her what I wanted her to do, and left the rest to herself.
“There!” she cried. “You have made my wig all crooked.”
And she ran to the looking-glass and set it straight again. There must have been something in her manner which made Mrs. Holdfast laugh, but as Fanny described it, her laugh was broken off in the middle.
“Come here directly,” said Mrs. Holdfast.
Fanny obeyed. Mrs. Holdfast knelt upon the ground, and, holding Fanny’s face between her hands, looked long and hard at her.
“I don’t know you,” she said; and then she coloured up, for she saw that Fanny was returning the earnest gaze.
“If you please, my lady,” said Fanny, “I beg your pardon for calling you Grace; my sister said you wouldn’t like it, but you were running away, and I couldn’t help it.”
“Who is your sister?” asked Mrs. Holdfast.
And now imagine Fanny, instead of at once answering the question, fainting dead away. A real swoon? Not a bit of it. A sham, to gain time to study the ground of action.