‘What nonsense!’ said Mrs. Gibson, with some annoyance.  ’Lady Harriet only went to see you out of a desire of amusement.  She would only make fun of the Miss Brownings, and then they will be quoting her and talking about her, just as if she was their intimate friend.’

’I don’t think she did make fun of them.  She really sounded as if she had been very kind.’

’And you suppose you know her ways better than I do, who have known her these fifteen years?  I tell you she turns every one into ridicule who does not belong to her set.  Why, she used always to speak of the Miss Brownings as “Pecksy and Flapsy."’

‘She promised me she would not,’ said Molly driven to bay.

‘Promised you!—­Lady Harriet?  What do you mean?’

’Only—­she spoke of them as Pecksy and Flapsy—­and when she talked of coming to call on me at their house, I asked her not to come if she was going to—­to make fun of them.’

’Upon my word! with all my long acquaintance with Lady Harriet I should never have ventured on such impertinence.’

‘I didn’t mean it as impertinence,’ said Molly, sturdily.  ’And I don’t think Lady Harriet took it as such.’

‘You can’t know anything about it.  She can put on any kind of manner.’

Just then Squire Hamley came in.  It was his first call; and Mrs Gibson gave him a graceful welcome, and was quite ready to accept his apology for its tardiness, and to assure him that she quite understood the pressure of business on every landowner who farmed his own estate.  But no such apology was made.  He shook her hand heartily, as a mark of congratulation on her good fortune in having secured such a prize as his friend Gibson, but said nothing about his long neglect of duty.  Molly, who by this time knew the few strong expressions of his countenance well, was sure that something was the matter, and that he was very much disturbed.  He hardly attended to Mrs. Gibson’s fluent opening of conversation, for she had already determined to make a favourable impression on the father of the handsome young man who was heir to an estate, besides his own personal agreeableness; but he turned to Molly, and, addressing her, said—­almost in a low voice, as if he was making a confidence to her that he did not intend Mrs. Gibson to hear,—­

’Molly, we are all wrong at home!  Osborne has lost the fellowship at Trinity he went back to try for.  Then he has gone and failed miserably in his degree, after all that he said, and that his mother said; and I, like a fool, went and boasted about my clever son.  I can’t understand it.  I never expected anything extraordinary from Roger; but Osborne—!  And then it has thrown madam into one of her bad fits of illness; and she seems to have a fancy for you, child!  Your father came to see her this morning.  Poor thing, she’s very poorly, I’m afraid; and she told him how she should like to have you about her, and he said I might fetch you.  You’ll come, won’t you, my dear?  She’s not a poor woman, such as many people think it’s the only charity to be kind to, but she’s just as forlorn of woman’s care as if she was poor—­worse, I dare say.’