"No; I leave that to you. Have you your spy Jane at the Towers?"
"Yes; she is an excellent wretch. Well, I am going. I intended to see you, and I have done so. I'm glad to find your misfortunes have not broken your spirit. Tell your father I came," she says, from the door; "unless, indeed, you would wish to tell him the whole story."
I ring the bell, and she vanishes.
"Was ever such a woman?" I say to myself, as I sit down: "no shame, no fear, no conscience. No wonder Paul and I were like wax in her hands. Her words cut me like knives, again and again. Did I wince under them, I wonder? I think I touched her once or twice: I am sure I tried hard enough."
I pick up my basket, innocent cause of my being caught, and go out into the garden, my heart beating, my pulses throbbing. How that evil, lovely face brings back to my memory that night at Luttrell when, though I knew it not, such happiness lay before me. Now the warning is fulfilled, and my lot in life is fixed.
My adventures this afternoon are doomed to conclude in a somewhat ludicrous manner, for, in crossing the orchard, I find poor Dolly in a state of siege, standing on a pile of planks against the wall, whither she has been driven by our new and potent tyrant, the ram. He was installed in the orchard last Monday, and a very lively time we have had of it ever since; indeed, it would be hard to say why he is here at all, unless the abundant abrasions inflicted by his horns on the family legs and shins find favour in the governor's eyes. Not but what he comes in for his share, for the ram is no respecter of persons, and only yesterday did we all, from behind corners, indulge in the exquisite diversion of watching him dodge papa round a tree, the governor—to his credit be it spoken—coming off victorious, although with some slight loss of dignity.
