behind a certain chair, which action on his part plainly indicated
that I was to sit there. I wondered why. Could it be that I had
arrived at the age when it is advisable for a woman to sit back to
the light at breakfast? Was this only another instance of
Bindon's devotion to us all? That the credit of the family is
paramount in his mind, I know! All this flashed through my mind,
but I saw a moment later that it was not of my complexion that
Bindon thought, for on a plate before the chair behind which he
stood, lay a small dark gray wad about the size of a five-shilling
piece. I hesitated., and Bindon said in an undertone, "Miss Betty
made it." Not a muscle of his face moved.

I sat down and gazed at the awful result of my present to Betty.
The -- what shall I call it? -- was gray, as I said before; it had
a crisscross pattern on it, deeply indented, and snugly sunk in
the middle of it was a currant. I sighed. My duty as a
professional aunt was clear: had I not in a moment of weakness
said I would eat anything Betty made, provided it was a proper
thing? Had I here a loophole of escape? No, it was certainly,
according to Betty's lights, a most proper thing. But why does
dough, in the hands of the cleanest child, become dark gray?

Bindon, having done his duty by Betty, and not being able on this
occasion to do it by both of us, made no further explanation.
Like the first step, it is no doubt the first bite that costs most
dearly; and while I was pondering whether to take two bites or
swallow it whole, Mr. Dudley came in and sat down opposite me. He
is a young man who thinks that no woman he doesn't know can be
worth knowing. When by force of circumstances he comes to know a
fresh one, he always tells her he feels as if he had known her all