Mathias crouched down, and crept under the bed, just in time, as the pert young lady skipped into the room.
Her first care was to turn up the lamp, and by its light she looked about her.
"I think they might have taken me to the ball with them," she said, saucily shaking her curls off her face. "I should have looked better than some of them, I'll be bound. I'm dead beat with fatigue. I've had all the work dressing them, and they are to get all the fun."
She was silent for some few minutes, and Mathias grew anxious.
What could be going forward?
He would vastly like to know.
Unable to control his curiosity, he peeped out, and then he saw pretty Marietta's portrait in the long looking-glass panel.
She looked prettier than ever now, for, shocking to relate, the young lady was undressing.
Mathias was not to say a bashful man, so he did not draw back.
On the contrary, he stared with all his eyes.