She did not even know how to sit down, but, still standing, she read the first words, and at the last, "Dear, dear Lucy,"-- "Yours ever and always, if you will have me, F.G." She did not want to read any more of it then.

She sat down slowly, put the precious paper back into its envelope, looked round upon them all, and knew that she was crimson to the roots of her hair, blushing like a guilty thing.
"Lucy, my dear," said Lady Fawn,--and Lucy at once turned her face full upon her old friend,--"you have got a letter that agitates you." "Yes,--I have," she said.
"Go into the book-room.

You can come back to breakfast when you have read it, you know." Thereupon Lucy rose from her seat, and retired with her treasure into the book-room.

But even when she was there she could not at once read her letter.

When the door was closed and she knew that she was alone she looked at it, and then clasped it tight between her hands.