"What?" cried they. "What is it?"
"He's there! He's there!"
"Who? who?" they cried, in alarm.
"That horrid man!"
Lady Dalrymple and Ethel looked at one another in utter horror.
As for Minnie, she burst into the room, peeped out of the windows, saw "that horrid man," then ran back, then sat down, then jumped up, and then burst into a peal of the merriest laughter that ever was heard from her.
"Oh, I'm so glad! I'm so glad!" she exclaimed. "Oh, it's so awfully funny. Oh, I'm so glad! Oh, Kitty darling, don't, please don't, look so cross. Oh, ple-e-e-e-e-e-e-ase don't, Kitty darling. You make me laugh worse. It's so awfully funny!"
But while Minnie laughed thus, the others looked at each other in still greater consternation, and for some time there was not one of them who knew what to say.
But Lady Dalrymple again threw herself in the gap.
"You need not feel at all nervous, my dears," said she, gravely. "I do not think that this person can give us any trouble. He certainly can not intrude upon us in these apartments, and on the highway, you know, it will be quite as difficult for him to hold any communication with us. So I really don't see any cause for alarm on your part, nor do I see why dear Minnie should exhibit such delight."