“Very well, I will,” he said, in a patient voice; “but I really do wish Aunt Anne would turn up. I want some more scissors; I lost all those she gave me, and some one stole the case.” “And Catty broke my velvet pincushion. It is, clearly, time that she turned up.” When Walter had gone, Florence thought of Mrs. North again. “It was rather unkind of me not to be nice to her, for she was generous to Aunt Anne,” she said to herself. “I wonder whether I could go and call upon her now. I might explain that I never dared to mention Madame Celestine’s bills.” But she had no more time in which to think of Mrs. North, for there were the inevitable domestic matters to arrange; and then Ethel Dunlop came in, full of her engagement to George Dighton. “I always imagined it was merely friendship,” Florence said, thinking regretfully of the editor. “Did you?” said Ethel, brightly. “We thought so ourselves for a long time, I believe; but we found out that we were mistaken. By the way, Florence, you can’t think how good Mr. Fisher has been to us.” “Mr. Fisher? Well, you don’t deserve anything from him.” “No, I don’t. Still, it wasn’t my fault that he proposed; I never encouraged him. How droll it was of him to come and pour out his troubles to you.” “I think it was manly and dignified,” Florence said; “it proved that he wasn’t ashamed of wanting to marry you. Did he write a nice letter, Ethel?” “Yes, very, I think.” “How did he begin?” “He began, ‘My dear Miss Ethel,’ and ended up, ‘Yours very faithfully.’” “I am afraid you did lead him on a little bit.” “Indeed I did not. He asked me to come and see his mother when she had this house, and he was always here.” “That was very nice of him,” Florence said; “it shows that he is very fond of his mother.” “Oh yes, it was very nice of him,” Ethel answered, “and he is very fond of his mother; but I found that he generally came a little before I did, and he always saw me home. I couldn’t refuse to let him do so, because he evidently thought it a matter of duty to see that I arrived safely at my own street door. Middle-aged men always seem to think that a girl must get into mischief the moment she is left to her own devices.” “How did he know of your engagement?” “I wrote and told him. He had been so kind that I felt it was due to him. I told him we should be as poor as church mice, as George would be in a government office all his life, with little to do and less to spend, after the manner of those officials; and he wrote back such a nice letter, inquiring into all our affairs and prospects—you would have thought he was our godfather, at least.” “He does that sort of thing to everybody,” Florence said; “he is astonishingly kind. He always seems to think he ought to do something for the good of every one he knows.” “Perhaps he mistakes himself for a minor providence, and goes about living up to it.” “Oh, Ethel!”