“Yes,” said Mr. Bates, with a smile of deep satisfaction, “it all turned out right.”
CHAPTER XI
A MATRIMONIAL BUREAU
“Ladybird and Stella Russell seem to be great cronies,” observed Miss Dorinda one afternoon as she sat knitting by the window and watched the two girls walking down the garden path.
“Yes,” said her sister; “and in some ways it is a good thing for Lavinia. She is so hoydenish and daring that I think a nice, quiet girl like Stella Russell will have a refining influence over her.”
“Ladybird isn’t unrefined, Priscilla,” said Miss Dorinda. Insinuations against her niece were the one thing which could rouse the meek and mild ire which this good lady possessed.
“No, not unrefined, since she is a Flint; but you must admit, Dorinda, that at times she is exasperating beyond all measure. Why, only this morning she cut the strings from my best bonnet, and tied them round the kittens’ necks, because, she said, she never had seen kittens with black ribbons on, and she wanted to see how funny they looked; and she said, too, that the bonnet looked better without strings.”
“Yes, she’s thoughtless and careless,” sighed Miss Dorinda, “but not wicked. I think she means all right.”
“Then she very seldom expresses her meaning,” snapped Miss Priscilla.
“Well, she’s only a child,” said Dorinda; “you can’t put old heads on young shoulders. Sometimes I think perhaps Stella’s influence isn’t altogether good for her: it may fill her head with grown-up nonsense. You know she’s so imaginative.”
“Oh, Stella isn’t flighty,” said Miss Priscilla. “She’s a fine, wholesome young woman, and I am sure Lavinia is already better for having known her.”