‘If you must know, it is the body of a mummy over whose dissection you will have to assist.’ ‘Ah! Rotherwood is coming.’ ‘Rotherwood!’ ‘And his little girl. Just like him. Lily gets a note this morning from London, telling her to telegraph if she can’t have them by the 5.20 train. I’ve just been ordering a fly. It seems that Lady Rotherwood, going to meet Ivinghoe at the station, coming from school, found he had measles coming out! So they packed off his sister to Beechcroft without having seen him, and thence Rotherwood took her to London.’ ‘And is having a fine frolic with her, no doubt; but he might as well have given Lily more notice, considering that a marquess or two makes more difference to her household than it does to his.’ ‘Oh! she is glad enough, only in some trepidation as to how Mrs. Halfpenny may receive the unspecified maid that the child may bring.’ ‘How jolly we shall be! I wish Ada had come.’ ‘I tried to drag her out, but it gets harder and harder to shake her up. You must come back with me and see her.’ ‘I say, Jane, have you seen Maurice’s child lately?’ ‘Not very. She wouldn’t come with the others last week.’ ‘What do you think about her? I thought leaving her with Lily would have been the making of her. Indeed, I told Maurice there could not be a better brought up set anywhere than the Merrifields, and that Lily would mother her like one of her own; and now I find her moping about, looking regularly down in the mouth. I got hold of her one day and tried to find out what was the matter, but she only said she would not complain. Can they bully her?’ ‘I’ll tell you what, Maurice, Lily is a great deal too kind to her. She has a kind of temper that won’t let them make friends with her.’ ‘Come now! She was a nice jolly little girl at home. She and I have had no end of larks together, and it is hard to blame her for fretting after her home, poor child--Aye! I know you never liked her, or she might have done better with you and Ada than turned in among a lot of imps.’ ‘I’m thankful it was otherwise!’ ‘Now do, Jane, set your mind to it. Don’t be prejudiced, but make those sharp eyes of some use. I really feel bound to give Maurice an account of Dolly, and tell him what is best for her.’ ‘I believe,’ said Jane, ‘that there is some counter-influence at work, and I am trying to find it out; but, after all, I believe patience is the only thing, and that Lily will conquer her if nobody meddles.’ ‘’Tis not Lily I am afraid of, but her children.’ ‘Nonsense, Regie; one would think you had never been turned loose into school to be licked into shape.’ ‘She is a girl, not a cub like me.’ ‘A worse cub, for she has not your temper, sir, and, moreover, you had had the wholesome discipline of a large family. Besides, nobody teases but Wilfred. Gillian and Mysie behave like angels to the tiresome puss.’ ‘Well, I’m bound to believe you, Jenny, but I don’t like the looks of it.’