“To Lillie Ellis.”
“John engaged to Lillie Ellis?” said Miss Ferguson, in a tone of shocked astonishment.
“She laid her head forward on the table.”
“So he writes me. He is completely infatuated by her.”
“How very sudden!” said Miss Letitia. “Who could have expected it? Lillie Ellis is so entirely out of the line of any of the women he has ever known.”
“That’s precisely what’s the matter,” said Miss Grace. “John knows nothing of any but good, noble women; and he thinks he sees all this in Lillie Ellis.”
“There’s nothing to her but her wonderful complexion,” said Miss Ferguson, “and her pretty little coaxing ways; but she is the most utterly selfish, heartless little creature that ever breathed.”
“Well, she is to be John’s wife,” said Miss Grace, sweeping the remainder of the flowers into her apron; “and so ends my life with John. I might have known it would come to this. I must make arrangements at once for another house and home. This house, so much, so dear to me, will be nothing to her; and yet she must be its mistress,” she added, looking round on every thing in the room, and then bursting into tears.