“I must risk that,” I answered — “I shall openly tell my reasons, If questioned, and I firmly believe they will be satisfactory, If not questioned, I shall say nothing ; and indeed I very much wish you would do the same.”

She agreed,—­consented, rather—­and I was the more obliged to her from seeing it was contrary to her inclination.  I was sorry, but I could not compliment at the expense of putting myself again into a situation I had been so earnest to change.  Miss Planta bore it very well, and only wished the maid farther for never finding us out till we began to be comfortable without her. 381

“Theequerries want the ladies.”

Here we remained about two hours, unsummoned, unnoticed, unoccupied,-except in forcing open a box which Mrs. Thielky had lent me for my wardrobe, and of which I had left the key, ingeniously, at Windsor.  At ten o’clock a maid caine to the door, and said supper was ready.

“Who sent you?” I called out.

“Who do you come from?” cried Miss Planta.

She was gone;—­we could get no answer.  About a quarter of an hour after, one of those gentlemen footmen, for whom you must already have discovered my partiality, called out, from the stairs, without troubling himself to come to the door, “The supper waits.”

He was already gone; but Miss Planta darted after him, calling out, “Who sent you?—­who did you come to?”

She was not heard by this gentleman, but what she said was echoed after him by some other, and the answer that reached our ears was, “The equerries want the ladies.”

This was enough; Miss Planta returned quite indignant, after hastily replying, “We don’t choose any supper.”

We were now precisely of an opinion.  Miss Planta, indeed, was much more angry than myself; for I was very sure the equerries had sent a very different message, and therefore thought nothing of the words used by the servant, but confined all my dissatisfaction to its first origin,—­the incivility of the ladies of the house, that they came not themselves, or some one from them, to invite us in a manner that might be accepted.  From this time, however, we became more comfortable, as absconding was our mutual desire; and we were flung, by this means, into a style of sociability we might else never have arrived at.

We continued together till Miss Planta thought it right to go and see if Mhaughendorf had prepared every thing for the princesses; and then I was left to myself-the very companion I just at that time most wished a t`ete-`a-t`ete with—­till I was summoned to the queen.  In this t`ete-`a-t`ete, I determined very concisely upon my plan of procedure:  which was to quietly keep my own counsel, unless I found my conduct disapproved — and, in that case, to run all risks in openly declaring that I must always prefer solitude to society upon terms to which I was unaccustomed. 382