There are many such "serio-comic governesses" in real life. Perhaps you, who read, may be one; perhaps, unknown to you, the dear friend from whom you have no secrets and who, you fondly believe, has none from you, may have a personality which you have never even guessed at.
In the case of our "serio-comic governess," however, we must draw a distinction. Lynn Thayer liked neither of her lives, which clashed horribly both with one another and with her sense of right. Since she saw no way in which she could avoid it, however, she continued to lead them to the best of her ability, sustained, if not comforted, by the thought that one of them was bound to terminate with the death of the one being whom she most loved.
We have seen our "serio-comic governess" in one role; now we see her in another. We have seen Punchinello with the mask off and the grin absent; now we see him as he appears daily in the theatre of life.
Lynn had returned from the school where she taught and sat in her aunt's sitting-room, engaged on a shirtwaist and in conversation. If we listen we shall be able to form a fair idea of the progress of the conversation, if not of that of the shirtwaist. Mrs. Thayer was employed in embroidering a collar and impressed the casual observer as doing the exact thing for which Nature had fitted her. She was one of those pretty, faded, querulous women with worthy hearts but limited intellects of whom one almost instinctively speaks as "poor thing"; why, it is hard to say, except that something in their appearance calls forth the expression. No one ever called Lynn Thayer "poor thing," nor would, whatever griefs or difficulties she might labour under.
Mrs. Thayer was speaking.
"Now, Lynn, why is he not coming here, to-night?"
"For one thing, because I don't want him; and, for another, because he is changing his hotel. You know he is staying at the 'Hastings' while his house is in the hands of the painters."
"And he is moving from the 'Hastings.' Why?"
"Oh, I think he said it was 'tough' and that he would have to leave it. I tried hard not to compliment him upon the altruism of his action. Certainly if one thing more than another is calculated to 'raise the tone' of a hotel, it is his leaving it."
"Lynn! you didn't tell him so?" shrieked her aunt.