“That,” said Sophy severely, “is what people always say when they are too lazy, or perhaps too timorous, to make a push to be helpful! I have a great many faults, but I am not lazy, and I am not timorous, though that, I know, is not a virtue, for I was born without any nerves at all, my father tells me, and almost no sensibility. I don’t know that I shall, for I have not yet made up my mind just what I should do, but I may need your assistance in breaking this foolish engagement.” She perceived, in a quick glance at his face, that he was looking extremely scared, and added reassuringly, “Very likely not, but one never knows, and it is always well to be prepared. Now I must put you down, for I see Cecilia awaiting me, and she had promised to let me drive her round the Park once she is assured I shan’t overturn the phaeton.”
“No fear of that!” said Mr. Wychbold, wondering what else this alarming young woman might overturn during her sojourn in Berkeley Square.
He shook hands, told her that if they would but allow females to belong to the Four-Horse Club he should certainly support her candidature, and sprang down from the phaeton, to exchange greetings with Cecilia, who, with Miss Adderbury and the children, were waiting beside the Drive. Gertrude, Amabel, and Theodore naturally asserted their claims to be taken up beside their cousin in preference to their elder sister, but after these had been firmly dealt with Mr. Wychbold helped Cecilia to mount into the carriage, bowed, and strolled off.
It had struck Sophy immediately that Cecilia was looking pale, while the little governess was plainly laboring under a considerable degree of suppressed agitation; so, since she believed in getting to the root of any matter without wasting time on circumlocution, she at once demanded bluntly, “Now, why are you looking as blue as megrim, Cecy?”
Tina, who, during Mr. Wychbold’s occupation of the passenger’s seat, had nestled inconspicuously behind her mistress’s feet, now crawled out from beneath the drab rug, and jumped on to Cecilia’s knee. Cecilia clasped her mechanically and stroked her, but said in a tense voice, “Eugenia!”
“Oh, the deuce take that creature!” exclaimed Sophy. “ Now what has she done?”
“She was walking here with Alfred,” said Cecilia, “and she came upon us!”
“Well,” said Sophy reasonably, “I own I do not like her, and Alfred is certainly the horridest little beast in nature, but I see nothing in that to put you so much out of countenance! He cannot have tried to put his arm round your waist if his sister was present!”
“Oh, Alfred!” said Cecilia contemptuously. “Not but what he would have me take his arm, and then squeezed it in the most odious way, and ogled, and said all the sort of things that make one itch to slap his face. But I care nothing for him! You see, Sophy, Augustus was with me!”
“Well?” said Sophy.