It was sitting with a Delf mug on it, poor thing.

Dear me! I little thought then--Really, I have never been so glad about anything before." After a little more conversation, and after Mr.Alwynn had been persuaded to give the reins to his niece, who was far more composed than himself, his mind reverted to his wife.
"I think, my dear, until your engagement is more settled, till I have had a talk with Dare on the subject (which will be necessary before you write to your uncle Francis), it would be as well not to refer to it before--in fact, not to mention it to Mrs.Alwynn.Your dear aunt's warm heart and conversational bent make it almost impossible for her to refrain from speaking of anything that interests her; and indeed, even if she does not say anything in so many words, I have observed that opinions are sometimes formed by others as to the subject on which she is silent, by her manner when any chance allusion is made to it." Ruth heartily agreed.

She had been dreading the searching catechism through which Mrs.Alwynn would certainly put her--the minute inquiries as to her dress, the hour, the place; whether it had been "standing up or sitting down;" all her questions of course interwoven with personal reminiscences of "how John had done it," and her own emotion at the time.
It was with no small degree of relief at the postponement of that evil hour that Ruth entered the house.

As she did so a faint sound reached her ear.

It was that of a musical-box.
"Dear! dear!" said Mr.Alwynn, as he followed her.