“Oh, there is! I am terribly thrilled over it!”
“‘Terribly thrilled’, are you? Did the lady tell you that your uncle wants you to go as soon as possible to the Van Meter place in New York and make your home there?”
“No, Mr. Conley. Oh, how can I do that? I’ll have to go to school some more, won’t I?”
“I think that your uncle has some idea of having you taught privately.”
“I wouldn’t like that at all. I don’t think that I will go,—yes, I will, too, for I must find out about my mother.”
Mr. Conley smiled at Janet’s independent speech and Janet realized as soon as she had spoken that she must do what her guardian said. Thank fortune her guardian was Miss Hilliard!
“Perhaps the lady who has written you is the one who will instruct you. But we shall see what Miss Hilliard has to say. Here she comes now,” and Mr. Conley rose to meet Miss Hilliard, who came across the wide room from the door into the hall.
“I suppose, John, you have come to tell us about Pieter Van Meter,” said Miss Hilliard, after she had shaken hands with the lawyer and he had placed a chair for her.
“Yes, Anna, that rather poetical name is the subject of my discourse.”
Janet could scarcely suppress a mild giggle at that. Pieter and Meter did make a sort of rhyme.