CHAPTER XII.
THE LAKE SHORE ROAD.
But all that I care for,
And all that I know,
Is that, without wherefore,
I worship thee so.
Lord Lytton.
"I suppose, Bluebell, you keep all your fine spirits for company?" said Miss Opie, tauntingly; and, indeed, she had some reason to be aggrieved. Few things are more trying than living with a person in the persistent enjoyment of the blues; and the old, saddened by failing health and the memory of heavy sorrows, are apt to look upon gloom in youth as entrenching on their own prescriptive rights.
Bluebell was always now taking long, aimless walks, bringing home neither news nor gossip, and then sitting silent, absorbed in her own thoughts, or else feverishly expectant; while each evening she sank into deeper despondency after the day's disappointment.
"Spirits can't be made to order," answered she, shortly. "I have got nothing to talk about."
"I am afraid you are ill, my dear," said Mrs. Leigh; "outgrowing your strength, perhaps. You are such a great girl, Bluebell—so different to me; and you scarcely touched the baked mutton at dinner, which was a little frozen and red yesterday, but so nice to-day."
Bluebell shivered. She was not at a very critical age, but the culinary triumphs of the "general servant" made her practice a good deal of enforced abstinence since she had been accustomed to properly prepared cookery at "The Maples."
"People who do nothing all day can't expect to be hungry," said Miss Opie, sententiously. "If a man will not work neither may he eat."