life, where the men of a country-town cannot emerge. Also, being a friend of a girl, she could get asked to what is known as the "county." Very likely Harry Majendie knew the son of someone who was county. But he could not sue for an invitation for Lucia. But Nellie Majendie could (and would) certainly ask the daughter of the county that her dear friend Lucia might come to the fireworks. And fireworks would lead to lunch. There was the avenue. But males at present were no kind of use to her. At least she had not, up till now, come across the male who could be. And Lucia was extremely practical.
It was the consciousness of which these thoughts formed background and groundwork that made her walk to the cricket-ground seem short. She could not long resist the impulse of her imagination to leap forward, but before permitting that, she wished to think over, and perhaps look down on, the rungs of the ladder which she had already traversed. Yes; it had been successfully done, and decidedly she had enjoyed herself more in this past month, and had become of greater importance in this microscopic world than ever before. So little effort had really been needed, and it quite pleased her to think that others as well as herself had been the happier for her exertions. And the greatest beneficiary was Aunt Cathie, on whom Lucia almost looked with tenderness sometimes. The old dear required so little; to be allowed to beat time, to show her new stippling touches, to put in an occasional gruff parfaitement, meant so much to her, while to have Aunt Cathie in this mood reacted again, and meant something to Lucia. Fair View, even when they were quite alone, had been so much less boring. After dinner, for instance, instead of Aunt Cathie nodding in a chair, while Lucia herself watched with suppressed yawns the hopeless efforts made by Aunt Elizabeth to defeat the Demon, and made perfunctory replies to her occasional asperities, Aunt Cathie had her Gasc or her "Fou Yégof" open before her, and was not disturbed by Lucia's practising of difficult passages in view of to-morrow's music. Sometimes she even helped Aunt Elizabeth with her dreary employment; but, to be frank, she did not receive much encouragement in this regard, and so did not often come to the rescue. Her efforts and exertions in any case were productive of greater happiness to others as well as herself, and she did not in the least grudge it them. Indeed, she began dimly to see that it "paid" to put people in a good humour, and since every paying concern had her sympathy, she continued to invest her time and her efforts in doing so.
