And honestly Sophia was horrified; shocked, as well as puzzled. So that it seemed to her no more than fitting, no more than a late awakening to decency when the culprit, who had accomplished--but with trembling fingers--the closing of the window, pressed her handkerchief to her eyes, and flung herself on the bed. Sophia saw her shoulders heave with emotion, and hoped that at last she understood what she had done; that at last she appreciated what others would think of such reckless, such inexplicable conduct. And my lady prepared to drive home the lesson. Judge of her surprise, when Lady Betty cut her first word short by springing up as hastily as she had thrown herself down, and disclosed a face convulsed not with sorrow, but with laughter.
"Oh, you silly, silly thing!" she cried; and before Sophia could prevent her, she had cast her arms round her neck, and was hugging her in a paroxysm of mirth: "Oh, you dear, silly old thing! And it's only a week since you eloped yourself!"
"I!" Sophia cried, enraged by the ungenerous taunt. And she tried fiercely but vainly to extricate herself.
"Yes, you! You! And were married at Dr. Keith's chapel! And now how you talk! Mercy, ma'am, butter won't melt in your mouth now!"
"Lady Betty!" Sophia cried, in a cold rage, "let me go! Do you hear? Let me go! How dare you talk to me like that? How dare you?" she continued, trembling with indignation. "What has my conduct to do with yours? Or how can you presume to mention it in the same breath? I may have been foolish, I may have been indiscreet, but I never, never, stooped to----"
"Call it the highway at once," said the unrepentant one, "for I know that is what you have in your mind."
Sophia gasped. "If you can put it so clearly," she said, "I hope you have more sense than appears from the--the----"
"Lightness of my conduct!" Lady Betty cried, with a fresh peal of laughter. "Oh, you dear, silly old thing, I would not be your daughter for something!"
"Lady Betty?"
"You dear, don't you Lady Betty me! A highwayman? Oh, it is too delicious! Too diverting! Are you sure it isn't Turpin come to life again? Or Cook of Barnet? Or the gallant Macheath from the Opera? Why, you old dear, the man is nothing better nor worse than a--lover!"