, the poor soul has the less time to lose."

But this was a topic on which Mrs. Pott understood no jesting. She was
well aware of our matron's inveteracy against her and her establishment,
and she resented it as a placeman resents the efforts of a radical. She
answered something sulkily, "That they that loosed letters should have
letters; and neither Luckie Dods, nor any of her lodgers, should ever
see the scrape of a pen from the St. Ronan's office, that they did not
call for and pay for."

It is probable that this declaration contained the essence of the
information which Lord Etherington had designed to extract by his
momentary flirtation with Mrs. Pott; for when, retreating as it were
from this sore subject, she asked him, in a pretty mincing tone, to try
his skill in pointing out another love-letter, he only answered
carelessly, "that in order to do that he must write her one;" and
leaving his confidential station by her little throne, he lounged
through the narrow shop, bowed slightly to Lady Penelope as he passed,
and issued forth upon the parade, where he saw a spectacle which might
well have appalled a man of less self-possession than himself.

Just as he left the shop, little Miss Digges entered almost breathless,
with the emotion of impatience and of curiosity. "Oh la! my lady, what
do you stay here for?--Mr. Tyrrel has just entered the other end of the
parade this moment, and Lord Etherington is walking that way--they must
meet each other.--O lord! come, come away, and see them meet!--I wonder
if they'll speak--I hope they won't fight--Oh la! do come, my lady!"

"I must go with you, I find," said Lady Penelope; "it is the strangest
thing, my love, that curiosity of yours about other folk's matters--I
wonder what your mamma will say to it."

"Oh! never mind mamma--nobody minds her--papa, nor nobody--Do come,
dearest Lady Pen, or I will run away by myself.--Mr. Chatterly, do make
her come!"

"I must come, it seems," said Lady Penelope, "or I shall have a pretty
account of you."

But, notwithstanding this rebuke, and forgetting, at the same time, that
people of quality ought never to seem in a hurry, Lady Penelope, with
such of her satellites as she could hastily collect around her, tripped
along the parade with unusual haste, in sympathy, doubtless, with Miss
Digges's curiosity, as her ladyship declared she had none of her own.

Our friend, the traveller, had also caught up Miss Digges's information;