"Oh, what an engrossing speech that imaginary one of yours must have been!" says Clarissa, with a little distracted shake of her head. "I knew you were in the room, didn't I? No, no, no, you are altogether wrong: this is no letter from maid or laundress, but from Georgie Broughton. (You must remember her name, I have so often mentioned it to you.) She is the dearest little thing in the world,--quite that, and more. And she writes, to tell me she is miserably poor, and wants to go out as a governess."
"Poor girl! Of all unhappy resources, the last."
"Yes; isn't it wretched? But, you see, she is bound to do something, and wearing out one's heart in a dingy school-room seems to be the only course left open to a pretty girl like Georgie."
"Try Mrs. Redmond, then. She is looking out for a governess for the children; and your friend might drop in there without further trouble."
"Oh, papa, but all those children! and Mrs. Redmond herself, too, so fretful and so irritable,--so utterly impossible in every way. Her very 'How d'ye do?' would frighten Georgie to death."
"People don't die of chills of that description; and your poor little friend can scarcely expect to find everything _couleur de rose_. Besides, 'all those children' you speak of just resolve themselves into two, as the boys are at school, and Cissy calls herself grown up. I should think Cissy would be, in fact, a great comfort to her, and would be amenable to her, and gentle--and that."
At this, Miss Peyton laughs a little, and bites her lip.
"Amenable," she says, slowly. "Do you know, I am afraid my Georgie is even younger than Cissy?"
"Well, she will certainly look younger; she has such a little, fresh, babyish rose-bud of a face. Do you think"--anxiously--"that would matter much?"
"It doesn't sound promising; but, if she is a good girl, one might forgive the great crime of being fresh and young. Dear me, it is very awkward. If she had been a nice, sensible, ugly, middle-aged person, now, all would have gone well; but, after all, poor child, of course she can't help her appearance."
"No, she certainly cannot," says Clarissa, with a sigh, heart-felt pity in her tone. "And her eyes are the very color of forget-me-nots,--quite the prettiest I ever saw. It is really too bad."