They are so giddy, there's no knowing what they might be after.

Besides,--they've got their work to mind." All this was very terrible to poor Dorothy, who had not as yet quite recovered from the original fear with which her aunt had inspired her,--so terrible that she was almost sorry that her mother and sister were coming to her.

When the knock was heard at the door, precisely as the cathedral clock was striking half-past ten,--to secure which punctuality, and thereby not to offend the owner of the mansion, Mrs.Stanbury and Priscilla had been walking about the Close for the last ten minutes,--Miss Stanbury was still in the parlour.
"There they are!" she exclaimed, jumping up.

"They haven't given a body much time to run away, have they, my dear?
Half a minute, Martha,--just half a minute!" Then she gathered up her things as though she had been ill-treated in being driven to make so sudden a retreat, and Martha, as soon as the last hem of her mistress's dress had become invisible on the stairs, opened the front door for the visitors.
"Do you mean to say you like it ?" said Priscilla, when they had been there about a quarter of an hour.
"H--u--sh," whispered Mrs.Stanbury.
"I don't suppose she's listening at the door," said Priscilla.
"Indeed, she's not," said Dorothy.

"There can't be a truer, honester woman, than Aunt Stanbury." "But is she kind to you, Dolly ?" asked the mother.
"Very kind; too kind.