two. But she
behaved very well, and I am inclined to think, in preparing buttered
muffins for her guest, she was more particular in the toasting, and
more generous with the butter, than she would have been had she been
preparing the dainty for drawing-room use. And when she learned that
Margaret had eaten nothing since breakfast, she herself went out
and brought in a sweetbread with her own hand, though she kept a
servant whom she might have sent to the shop. And, for the honour of
lodging-house keepers, I protest that that sweetbread never made its
appearance in any bill.

"You will be more comfortable down here with me, won't you, my dear,
than up there, with not a creature to speak to?"

In this way Mrs Protheroe made her apology for giving Miss Mackenzie
her tea downstairs, in a little back parlour behind the kitchen. It
was a tidy room, with two wooden armchairs, and a bit of carpet over
the flags in the centre, and a rug before the fire. Margaret did
not inquire why it smelt of tobacco, nor did Mrs Protheroe think
it necessary to give any explanation why she went up herself at
half-past seven to answer the bell at the area; nor did she say
anything then of the office messenger from Somerset House, who often
found this little room convenient for his evening pipe. So was passed
the first evening after our Griselda had left the Cedars.

The next day she sat at home doing nothing,--still talking to Hannah
Protheroe, and thinking that perhaps John Ball might come. But he
did not come. She dined downstairs, at one o'clock, in the same
room behind the kitchen, and then she had tea at six. But as Hannah
intimated that perhaps a gentleman friend would look in during
the evening, she was obliged to betake herself, after tea, to the
solitude of her own room. As Hannah was between fifty and sixty, and
nearer the latter age than the former, there could be no objection to
her receiving what visitors she pleased. The third day passed with
Miss Mackenzie the same as the second, and still no cousin came to
see her. The next day, being Sunday, she diversified by going to
church three times; but on the Sunday she was forced to dine alone,
as the gentleman friend usually came in on that day to eat his bit of
mutton with his friend, Mrs Protheroe.

"A most respectable man, in the Admiralty branch, Miss Margaret, and
will have a pension of twenty-seven shillings and sixpence a week in
a year or two. And it is so lonely by oneself,