“I declare, Charlotte,” interposed Miss Emilie Jones, who was one of Miss Varley’s most sincere despisers, “the effervescence of your regard for Sabbath-schools and ‘cent societies,’ has quite anticipated the sequel of Mrs. Tower’s story—you did not allow her time to say whether we are to be favored by the accession of a _lady_ or a _gentleman_ to our little country community—but consulting your own fancy, I suppose you took it for granted it must be a ‘pious young gentleman.’” The color deepened in Charlotte’s really beautiful face, as a glimpse of her ridiculous position flashed from Emilie’s playful satire, and to increase her confusion, the girls all laughed more saucily than before. There might have been some serious heart-burnings, but Mrs. Tower came to the rescue. “Charlotte is entirely excusable, young ladies,” she said, “and I am responsible for her remark by my own ambiguity. My friend is a _lady_, and one of the loveliest of her sex in mind and heart. I have not seen her since she grew into a woman, but I am confident from what I know of the development of her character, I shall not be disappointed in the promise of her childhood. She will be here in two weeks at most, and possibly sooner. Now I am old and dull girls, and I shall draw largely on your vivacity for her entertainment, at _first_ for _my_ sake, and afterward, when you know her, for her own.” “O yes, indeed, Mrs. Tower,” promised the girls, and none more promptly than Charlotte and Adelaide Varley, both for themselves and for their mother and three sisters at home. They would specially make a party for her, though they had determined to make _no_ parties till their friends, Mrs. Tyler and her daughter, very genteel people from New York, should come, which event could not certainly be hoped for at least for three weeks. And Misses Charlotte and Adelaide telegraphed to each other, while the rest were promising their attentions, how much pleasure it must afford Mrs. Tyler and Elizabeth if they should happen to recognize a city acquaintance in Mrs. Tower’s expected visiter—“as their metropolitan friends,” Charlotte remarked, “were so very gay and fashionable, they had sometimes languished in the country for a city face or something that looked familiar.”