All the air of it!—I liked that.
“Count Fiddlestrings. Mr Southwick is a fool and an ass. He’s only a paltry captain—on half-pay at that, without the shadow of an expectation. Lady C— has been telling me all about him.”
“Indeed!”
I thought there was a sigh, but I could not be sure of it. I should have liked it very much; but then what came after would, or should, have rendered me indifferent to it.
“And you’ve engaged yourself to him for another dance, while young Lord P— has been twice here to ask for you—absolutely on his knees for me to intercede for him!”
“What’s to be done?”
“Done! throw him over. Tell him you forgot that you had a previous engagement with Lord P—.”
“Very well, mamma, if you say so, I’ll do that. I’m so sorry it should have happened.”
There was no sigh this time, else I might have held my peace, and stolen quietly away. But I found I could not retreat without being discovered. In fact, I was at that moment discovered, and determined on making a clean breast of it.
“I should be sorry, Miss Mainwaring,” I said, addressing myself directly to the daughter, and without heeding the confusion of herself or her mother, “to stand in the way of a previous engagement, and rather than Lord P— should get on his knees for the third time, I beg to release you from that you have made with a paltry captain.”