"You won't laugh when you see her, Lina; and she is coming to-morrow to listen to your singing. Travers has told me she was raving about your singing at Madam Colebrook's the other evening, and he is to be here to-morrow and introduce her."
"He is very obliging, I am sure," said Caroline with another little laugh. "There is a letter to Ronzini which should be sent by a messenger early to-morrow to Bristol. Can you write it?"
"It is early to-morrow now," replied Alex. "Stay, good sister. I must to bed, and you should follow, or you will not be in trim to sing to the lady fair to-morrow. Come!"
"The bees make the honey, Alex; it would not answer if all were butterflies. You are one of those who think that folks were made to make your life pleasant."
"Bees can sting, I see," was Alexander's remark. "But give me a kiss, Lina; we don't forget our old home-love, do we? Let us hold together."
"I am willing, dear Alex; if I am crabbed at times, make excuses. These servants are a pest. I could fancy this last is a thief: the odds and ends vanish, who knows how? Oh! I do long for the German households which go on oiled wheels, and don't stop and put everyone out—time and temper too—like these English ones."
"We will all hasten back to Hanover, sister, with the telescopes at our backs, when——"
"When the thirty-foot mirror is made. Ah!—a——"
This last interjection was prolonged, and turned into a sigh, almost a groan.
When Alex was gone his sister got up and walked two or three times round the room, drank a glass of cold water, opened the shutters, and looked out into the night.