THE LADY FROM BUCKINGHAMSHIRE.
Mrs. Steward was a great contrast to Mrs. Lewis. Mrs. Steward was a tall, thin, rather refined-looking woman. Mrs. Lewis was fat and dumpy, decidedly untidy in appearance, with a melancholy air and a habit of constantly indulging in low weeping. Mrs. Steward looked as if she had never wept in her life; she sat upright as a dart, her movements were quick, her manners independent; she had a vivacious eye, a somewhat short nose, thin lips, and a very decided manner.
Mrs. Steward and Mrs. Lewis had a long conversation in the untidy, ugly little parlor, while they waited for Elma to return from school. Maggie had been going in and out, glancing with some apprehension at the lady, and then whisking back to her kitchen to sigh profoundly and mourn for the violets which were no longer in her possession.
"I should like something to eat," said Mrs. Steward to her sister. "I thought I would come to you for lunch, Caroline. Have you got anything in the house—a lamb chop or even cold lamb and salad will do quite nicely."
"My dear Charlotte," said Mrs. Lewis, laying her fat, tremulous hand upon her sister's firm but thin arm, "do you think it likely that we often have lamb chops or even cold lamb and salad for lunch? It is true that since the Australian meat came in we can now and then indulge in a very small joint of lamb for Sundays, but certainly on no other day. Ah, Charlotte, you little know the poverty to which your poor sister is subjected."
"I know all about it," said Mrs. Stewart, shaking herself angrily, "and my plain answer to you is this—as you sow you must reap. What else did you expect when you married that fool of a man, James Lewis?"
Mrs. Lewis made a great endeavor to rise from the sofa, she made a further effort to look dignified; but all she could really accomplish was to burst into a fresh wail of low weeping and to murmur under her breath, "Charlotte, you are cruel to me, you are cruel."
"I don't mean to be, my dear; but really, Caroline, you do annoy me. Have you no spunk at all in your composition? Are you still fretting your heart out for that good-for-nothing man?"
"Well, you see, I love him," said the poor wife. "The parting from my dear husband was a terrible trial. I think of him at all hours both day and night. I often have an uncontrollable desire to join him in Australia."
"Pray yield to it," said Mrs. Steward in the calmest of voices, "and when you go, take that great lout of a Caroline with you. She is as like you in appearance as one pea is like another. I am ashamed of you. Now, let us turn to a more congenial topic. Little Elma, I am glad to say, is made of very different stuff."