Sidney Walker.
"My dear, I cannot understand it!" said Miss Charlotte Willoughby.
"It is most strange—you don't think Mrs. Battishill can have kept them to tea?" hazarded Miss Fanny, in her gentle way.
Miss Charlotte crushed her, as usual.
"Jane stay out to tea without leave? She has never done such thing a before."
"It's very warm. They may be lingering on account of the heat," put in Miss Ellen's quiet voice.
"The heat is not too great for any healthy girl," said Miss Emily, with decision. "I have noticed lately in Elaine a very languid and dawdling way of doing things. I shall speak to her on the subject. I don't know what she has to occupy her thoughts, but she evidently is never thinking of what she is doing."
"She is a dear good child, on the whole," said Miss Fanny, comfortably.
"I cannot help thinking that she sometimes finds her life dull," said Ellen.