“What went wrong at last?” said I.  “That tiresome Latin, I dare say.”

“No! it was not the Latin.  Peter was in high favour with my father, for he worked up well for him.  But he seemed to think that the Cranford people might be joked about, and made fun of, and they did not like it; nobody does.  He was always hoaxing them; ‘hoaxing’ is not a pretty word, my dear, and I hope you won’t tell your father I used it, for I should not like him to think that I was not choice in my language, after living with such a woman as Deborah.  And be sure you never use it yourself.  I don’t know how it slipped out of my mouth, except it was that I was thinking of poor Peter and it was always his expression.  But he was a very gentlemanly boy in many things.  He was like dear Captain Brown in always being ready to help any old person or a child.  Still, he did like joking and making fun; and he seemed to think the old ladies in Cranford would believe anything.  There were many old ladies living here then; we are principally ladies now, I know, but we are not so old as the ladies used to be when I was a girl.  I could laugh to think of some of Peter’s jokes.  No, my dear, I won’t tell you of them, because they might not shock you as they ought to do, and they were very shocking.  He even took in my father once, by dressing himself up as a lady that was passing through the town and wished to see the Rector of Cranford, ’who had published that admirable Assize Sermon.’  Peter said he was awfully frightened himself when he saw how my father took it all in, and even offered to copy out all his Napoleon Buonaparte sermons for her—­him, I mean—­no, her, for Peter was a lady then.  He told me he was more terrified than he ever was before, all the time my father was speaking.  He did not think my father would have believed him; and yet if he had not, it would have been a sad thing for Peter.  As it was, he was none so glad of it, for my father kept him hard at work copying out all those twelve Buonaparte sermons for the lady—­that was for Peter himself, you know.  He was the lady.  And once when he wanted to go fishing, Peter said, ’Confound the woman!’—­very bad language, my dear, but Peter was not always so guarded as he should have been; my father was so angry with him, it nearly frightened me out of my wits:  and yet I could hardly keep from laughing at the little curtseys Peter kept making, quite slyly, whenever my father spoke of the lady’s excellent taste and sound discrimination.”

“Did Miss Jenkyns know of these tricks?” said I.

“Oh, no!  Deborah would have been too much shocked.  No, no one knew but me.  I wish I had always known of Peter’s plans; but sometimes he did not tell me.  He used to say the old ladies in the town wanted something to talk about; but I don’t think they did.  They had the St James’s Chronicle three times a week, just as we have now, and we have plenty to say; and I remember the clacking noise there always was when some of the ladies got together.  But, probably, schoolboys talk more than ladies.  At last there was a terrible, sad thing happened.”  Miss Matty got up, went to the door, and opened it; no one was there.  She rang the bell for Martha, and when Martha came, her mistress told her to go for eggs to a farm at the other end of the town.