"Auntie, how can you say anything so horrid? Not care for Allan! When he is in sad trouble, too! This morning's letter gives a most melancholy account of his father. I fear the end must be near. It was horrid of me to come running and singing over the grass; but these frosty mornings are so delicious. Look at that glorious blue sky!"
"And when all is over, Allan will come back to you, I suppose? I must say you have endured the separation in the calmest way."
"Why should I make myself unhappy? I know that it is Allan's duty to be at Fendyke. The only thing I regret is that I can't be there too, to help him to bear his sorrow."
"And you do not mind being parted from him. You can live without him?"
Suzette smiled at the sentimental question from the lips of her practical aunt, whose ideas seemed rarely to soar above the daily cares of housekeeping and the considerations of twopence as against twopence halfpenny.
"I have had to live without him over twenty years, auntie."
"Yes, but I thought that the moment a girl was engaged she found life impossible in the absence of her sweetheart."
"I think that kind of girl must be very empty-headed."
"And your little brains are well furnished—and then you have Mrs. Wornock and her son to fill up your days," said Mrs. Mornington, with a searching look.
"I have Mrs. Wornock, and I like her society. I see very little of Mrs. Wornock's son."