"My dear, I wouldn't breathe a word to a soul not if it were to save my life. Didn't Christopher tell me all about it last night, sitting there in his big chair, looking so good and beautiful, more fit to be lifted straight up to heaven, as I always say, than to be down here in father's big elbow chair, and with the tears all but running down his cheeks, so that he had to take off his spectacles to wipe them." "But, Miss Cosie--" "And to begin in that joking way, too," went on Miss Cosie, too intent on her reminiscences to heed the interruption. "'Well, Charlotte, my dear,'--I hardly thought I should be deceived at my time of life in this bare-faced manner,--'what do you think this sly little puss of a schoolmistress has been doing?' that's how he began." "I wish I had been behind the door." "Why, it was as good as a play, and he enjoying my fright, for I was quite in a fuss and worry in a moment. 'Don't tell me that our Miss Marriott could do anything wrong, for I won't believe it, Kit,' I returned; 'for she is as good a girl as ever lived, and a better sister to that poor little sickly child never breathed, and you may take my word for it, as sure as my name is Charlotte Logan.'" "Thank you for that, dear Miss Cosie." "'Don't put yourself out, Charlotte, there is no reason for it,' he answers, quite calmly. 'I am not saying a word against Miss Marriott's goodness; but she is a sly little creature for all that, for she is hiding from us all that she is a rich woman, with a tidy little fortune of five thousand a-year.' Dear, dear, the maze I was in when he said that!" "If only I had been there!" ejaculated Queenie feelingly. "I wouldn't believe it for a long time, and then it seemed to come on me like a flash. 'Why of course, Kit, my dear,' I said, as well as I could speak for crying, for he had been telling me all about the Brierwood Cottage conspiracy as he called it, and a more blessed deed of charity never reached my ears; but it shall be restored four-fold, pressed out and running over, and all that, my dear, you may rest assured of that. 'Why it stands to reason, Kit, my dear,' I said, 'that a young lady like Miss Marriott, who has the carriage of a duchess, and puts on her clothes well, and always holds her head high, and looks you in the face, and moves about as though she knew there was a barouche and pair waiting for her round every corner; why it stands to reason that a noble young creature like that should turn out to be somebody.'" "But, Miss Cosie," exclaimed Queenie, trying not to laugh in the little woman's face, "I am the same that I was before; it does not make any difference in me, really, because Emmie's uncle chose to leave me all his money." "No, my dear, certainly not; and of course in church you will always call yourself a miserable sinner, and all that, and of course that will be right and proper; but if only you could have heard what Christopher said about you! but I must not make you vain."