"Nor I," said the Doctor, with a quiet laugh; and he could not help thinking it would be good sport to see Cavendish come into the drawing-room all by himself without any support, and make his appearance before Miss Marjoribanks, and do his best to be agreeable, with an awful consciousness of his bad behaviour, and nobody sufficiently benevolent to help him out. The Doctor thought it would serve him right, but yet he was not sufficiently irritated nor sufficiently sympathetic to lose any of the humour of the situation; and it was with a little zest, as for something especially piquant, that he looked forward to the evening. As for Miss Marjoribanks, she too recognised the importance of the occasion. She resolved to produce that evening a new _plat_, which had occupied a corner of her busy mind for some time past. It was a crisis which called for a new step in advance. She sat down by the window after breakfast with various novel combinations floating in her creative brain; and while she was revolving these ideas in her mind, Nancy came in with more than her usual briskness. It is true that Lucilla had her household well in hand, and possessed the faculty of government to a remarkable extent; but still, under the best of circumstances, it was a serious business to propose a new dish to Nancy. Dr Marjoribanks's factotum was a woman of genius in her way, and by no means unenlightened or an enemy of progress; but then she had a weakness common to many persons of superior intelligence and decided character. When there was anything new to be introduced, Nancy liked to be herself the godmother of the interesting novelty; for, to be sure, it was her place, and Miss Lucilla, though she was very clever, was not to be expected to understand what came in best with the other dishes for a dinner. "I ain't one as goes just upon fish and flesh and fowl, like some as call themselves cooks," Nancy said. "If I have a failing, it's for things as suits. When it's brown, make it brown, and don't be mean about the gravy-beef--that's my principle; and when it ain't brown, mind what you're a-doing of--and don't go and throw a heap of entrys and things at a gentleman's head without no 'armony. I always says to Miss Lucilla as 'armony's the thing; and when I've set it all straight in my mind, I ain't one as likes to be put out," Nancy would add, with a gleam in her eye which betokened mischief. Miss Marjoribanks was much too sensible not to be aware of this peculiarity; and accordingly she cleared her throat with something as near nervousness as was possible to Lucilla before she opened her lips to propose the innovation. Miss Marjoribanks, as a general rule, did not show much nervousness in her dealings with her prime minister, any more than in her demeanour towards the less important members of society; and consequently Nancy remarked the momentary timidity, and a flash of sympathy and indignation took the place of her usual impulse of defiance.