'It is dreadfully cold, isn't it ?' "We were tremendously well wrapped up--there were hot-water tins in the carriage, and every comfort possible for winter travellers.

Yet it was true.

It was, as I said, bitterly cold.
"'Don't say that already, Laura,' said Mary anxiously, 'or I shall begin to wish I had stood out against your coming with me.' "'Oh, dear Mary, you couldn't have come alone,' I said.
"I was only fifteen.

My accompanying Mary was purely for the sake of being a companion to her, though in my own mind I thought it very possible that, considering the nature of the 'business' we were bent upon, I might prove to be of practical use too.

I must tell you what this same 'business' was.