"Why, that is just what I want to tell you, ma'am, and to ask your advice about. She come here--Mrs. Barnaby I mean--to look after that saucy Betty Jacks, by way of taking her to be her servant, and travelling about with her; and, upon my word, Miss Compton, she might just as well take my cat there, for any good or use she's likely to be of: and besides that, ma'am, I have no ways a good opinion of the child,--for child she is, though she's such a monster in tallness;--she does not speak the truth, Miss Compton, and that's what I can't abide, and I don't think she'll do me any credit in any way; ... but yet I'm afraid it would be doing a bad action if I was to stand in the girl's light, and prevent her going, by telling all the ill I think of her, when they comes again to-morrow to settle about it." Mrs. Sims ceased, and certainly expected a decided opinion from Miss Compton on the subject, for that lady had kept her eyes fixed upon her, and appeared to be listening with very profound attention; but the only reply was, "And do you think the girl will come with her?" "Come with who, ma'am?" "With Mrs. Barnaby, to be sure." "Oh no, ma'am! she won't come with her.... She will go home, as usual, to-night, and is to come back to meet the ladies here, a little after noon to-morrow, with her father." "But Agnes ... Miss Willoughby I mean, ... are you sure she will come back with her aunt to-morrow?" "I am sure I can't say, ma'am, ... but I think she will; for I well remember Mrs. Barnaby said with her grand way, ... 'We will walk over to-morrow if the weather be anyways fine.'" Miss Compton now seemed sunk in profound meditation, of which Mrs. Sims fully hoped to reap the fruits; but once more she was disappointed, for when Miss Compton again spoke, it was only to say,-- "I want to see Agnes Willoughby, Mrs. Sims, and I do not want to see Mrs. Barnaby. Do you think you could manage this for me, if I come here again to-morrow?" "I am sure, ma'am," replied Mrs. Sims, looking a little surprised and a little puzzled--"I am sure there is nothing that I am not in duty bound to do for you, if done it can be; and if you will be pleased to say how the thing shall be managed, I will do my part with a right good will to make everything go as you wish." This was a very obliging reply, but it shewed Miss Compton that she must trust to her own ingenuity for discovering the ways and means for putting her design in practice. After thinking about it a little, and looking round upon the locale, she said,--