"Why, my dear Mrs Phoebe! what an unlooked-for pleasure!" exclaimed Lady Betty, coming forward cordially. If her cordiality had been a shade more distinct since Phoebe became heiress of Cressingham--well, she was only human. The other ladies present had sustained no such change. "The Lord bless thee, dear child!" was the warm greeting of Mrs Dolly; but it had been quite as warm long before. "Evening!" said Mrs Jane, with a sarcastic grin. "Got it over, has he? Saw you through the side window. Bless you, child, I know all about it--I expected that all along. Hope you let him catch it--the jackanapes!" "I did not let him catch me, Mrs Jane," answered Phoebe, with some dignity. "That's right!" said Mrs Jane, decidedly. "That bundle of velvet and braid would never have made any way with me, when I was your age, my dear. Why, any mantua-maker could cut him out of snips, and have some stuff left over." "He is of very good family, my dear Mrs Jane," observed Lady Betty; "at least, if I take you rightly in supposing you allude to Mr Welles." "More pity for the family!" answered Mrs Jane. "Glad I'm not his mother. Ruin me to keep, him in order. Cost a fortune in whip-leather. How's Mrs Rhoda?" "She is very well, I thank you, Madam." "Is she crying out her eyes over that piece of fiddle-faddle?" "I think she has finished for the present," replied Phoebe, rather drily. "Just you tell her he's been making up to you. Best thing you can do. Cure her sooner than anything else." "Mrs Phoebe, my dear, may I beg of you to do me the favour to let Madam know that my niece, my Lady Delawarr, is much disordered in her health?" "Certainly, my Lady Betty; I am grieved to hear it." "Very much so, as 'tis feared; and Sir Richard hath asked me thither to visit her, and see after matters a little while she is laid by. I purpose to go thither this next week, but I would not do so without paying my respects to Madam, for which honour I trust to wait on her to-morrow. Indeed, my dear--and if you will mention it to Madam, you will do me a service--Sir Richard's letter is not without some importunity that should my niece be laid aside for any time, as her physician fears, I would remove altogether, and make my home with them." "Indeed, Madam, I will tell my mother all about it." "I thank you, my dear; 'twill be a kindness. Of course, I would not like to leave without Madam's concurrence." "That you will have," quietly said Mrs Dorothy. "Indeed, so I hope," returned Lady Betty. "I dare say Mrs Phoebe here at least does not know that when my nephew Sir Richard was young, after his mother died--my poor sister Penelope--he was bred up wholly in my care, so that he looks on me rather as his mother than his aunt, and 'tis but natural that his thoughts should turn to me in this trouble." "You must have been a young aunt, my Lady Betty," remarked Mrs Dorothy. "Truly, but twelve years elder than my nephew," said Lady Betty, with a smile.