"But Mrs. Law addresses me as, 'Dear Miss Falconer'; had I not better begin, 'Dear Madam, or dear Mrs. Law'?"
"Oh! not 'Dear Mrs. Law.' My dear child, how ignorant you are of etiquette."
Joyce seated herself, and wrote a few words accepting the invitation from Saturday to the Monday following, and took it herself to the footman.
"You should have rung for Phœbe, really Joyce, my dear!" But it was too late. Charlotte, who had been "composing" in the sitting-room upstairs, had heard voices, and now came down just as Joyce had closed the door on the footman from the palace.
"An invitation to stay at the palace! Oh! Joyce, how fortunate you are. Mrs. Law might have asked me!"
"She knows you live in the place, my love," said Miss Falconer.
Charlotte sighed. "If I did not live here it would be all the same."
But Charlotte was really an amiable girl, and her devotion to Joyce was sincere and true.
"Well," she said, "what will you wear, dear? Can I lend you any pretty things? My amber beads—or—my filigree comb. Oh! I forgot! Of course, you are still in deep black."
"It is very kind of you, Charlotte," Joyce said; "you always are kind; but I don't want anything."