“Mother, when we were in the park we met Miss Butler, just by the fountain, you know; and she kissed me, and asked me how my mother is”—said à-propos of nothing, in the most quiet, easy way.
I met Miss Butler this morning, and thanked her for the kind inquiries she had been making through my little girl; and—“Do you think Fanny grown?”
Miss Butler looked perplexed; Fanny was a great favourite of hers, perhaps because of the loveliness of which her parents could not pretend to be unaware.
“It is more than a month since I have seen the little maid, but I shall look in soon, and gladden her mother’s heart with all the praises my sweet Fan deserves!”
Little she knew that shame, and not pride, dyed my cheek; but I could not disclose my Fanny’s sad secret to even so near a friend.
But to talk it out with John is a different matter. He ought to know. And, certainly, men have more power than women to see into the reasons and the bearings of things. There had I been thinking for months in a desultory kind of way as to the why and wherefore of this ingrained want of truthfulness in the child, and yet I was no nearer the solution.
A new departure in the way of lying made me at last break the ice with John; indeed, this was the only subject about which we had ever had reserves.
“Mother, Hugh was so naughty at lessons this morning! He went close up to Miss Clare while she was writing, nudged her elbow on purpose, and made her spill the ink all over the table-cloth.”
I chanced to meet Miss Clare in the hall, and remarked that I heard she had found Hugh troublesome this morning.
“Troublesome? Not at all; he was quite industrious and obedient.”