"My dears," he said, faltering, "I have got a letter from your aunt Jane. I am afraid it will take you by surprise as--as it has done me. She wants you to--go--to school." "To school!" they cried both together, in unfeigned horror and alarm. Miss Brown, who had been ruling her copybooks very nicely, acknowledging Mr. St. John's entrance only by a smile, let the pencil drop out of her hand. "It is--very sudden," he said, trembling--"very sudden. Your poor aunt is that kind of woman. She means to be very kind to you, my dears; and she has made up her mind that you must be educated----" "Educated! Are we not being educated now? Miss Brown teaches us everything--everything we require to know," said Cicely, her colour rising, planting herself in front of the governess; as she had sprung up to defend her sister, when Miss Maydew saw her first. At that age Cicely was easily moved to indignation, and started forward perhaps too indiscriminately in behalf of any one who might be assailed. She was ready to put Miss Brown upon the highest pedestal, whenever a word was said in her disfavour. "So I think, my dear; so I think," said the frightened curate. "I made that very remark to your aunt; but it is very difficult to struggle against the impetuosity of a lady, and--and perhaps being taken by surprise, I--acquiesced more easily than I ought." "But we won't go--we can't go," cried Mab. "I shall die, and Cicely will die, if we are sent away from home." "My dears!" said poor Mr. St. John--this impetuosity was terrible to him--"you must not say so; indeed you must not say so. What could I say to your aunt? She means to give you all she has, and how could I oppose her? She means it for the best. I am sure she means it for the best." "And did you really consent," said Cicely, seriously, looking him straight in the eyes, "without ever saying a word to us, or to Miss Brown? Oh, papa, I could not have believed it of you! I hate Aunt Jane! Miss Brown, dear!" cried the girl, throwing her arms suddenly round the little governess, "it is not Mab's fault nor mine!" Then it was Miss Brown's turn to fall upon the unhappy curate and slay him. "My dear love," she said, "how could I suppose it was your fault or Mab's? Except a little levity now and then, which was to be expected at your age, you have been very good, very good children. There is no fault at all in the matter," she continued, turning with that magnanimity of the aggrieved which is so terrible to an offender, to Mr. St. John. "Perhaps it is a little sudden; perhaps a person so fond of the girls as I am might have been expected to be consulted as to the best school; for there is a great difference in schools. But Miss Maydew is very impetuous, and I don't blame your dear papa. When do you wish me to leave, sir?" she said, looking at him with a smile, which tortured the curate, upon her lips. "Miss Brown, I hope you will not think badly of me," he said. "You can't think how hard all this is upon me."