"Aura Stanley, you wicked girl, how dare you tell my friends such falsehoods about me? You know very well I am not married, and that I have lived under your father's roof ever since the day I came from Europe!" she cried angrily, her hazel eyes flashing like stars, and her pale cheeks beginning to glow with resentment.
It was certainly a very trying moment for Aura, for now she knew that her last chance of ingratiating herself with the Winans family and winning Earle was over. They would be sure to cut her acquaintance after this terrible exposé.
Her first impulse was to fly from the scene of her discomfiture, but the next moment a clever thought came to her, and she stood her ground boldly.
Coolly facing angry little Ladybird, she exclaimed:
"You need not call ugly names, nor look so angry, Ladybird, for it is not my fault that you have been reported married. Papa had his own reasons, I suppose, for telling it, and for instructing me to say so. Of course he did not expect that any one would come to inquire after you, as your father left you a pauper on our hands."
No one was paying any attention to her words, for the hapless orphan girl had been in turn kissed and caressed by Mrs. Winans and her daughters while she was speaking.
"Oh, Ladybird, you must come home with us, and be my dear sister!" cried Precious tenderly.
"And my dear daughter," added her mother.
The burning tears rushed to Ladybird's eyes as she cried gratefully:
"Oh, how happy I shall be to go with you, for I am tired of being Mrs. Stanley's waiting-maid, with my dependence thrown up to me every hour."