becomingly, and to put that part which she enacted into properly heroic
words, shall stalk in among us at some considerably later period in the
narrative, when the writer shall have accustomed himself to the flow of
words, and have worked himself up to a state of mind fit for the reception
of noble acting and noble speaking. In the meantime, let it be understood
that poor little Lucy Morris was a governess in the house of old Lady Fawn
when our beautiful young widow established herself in Mount street.

Lady Eustace and Lucy Morris had known each other for many years--had
indeed been children together, there having been some old family
friendship between the Greystocks and the Morrises. When the admiral's
wife was living, Lucy had, as a little girl of eight or nine, been her
guest. She had often been a guest at the deanery. When Lady Eustace had
gone down to the bishop's palace at Bobsborough, in order that an heir to
the Eustaces might be born under an auspicious roof, Lucy Morris was with
the Greystocks. Lucy, who was a year younger than Lizzie, had at that time
been an orphan for the last four years. She too had been left penniless,
but no such brilliant future awaited her as that which Lizzie had earned
for herself. There was no countess-aunt to take her into her London house.
The dean and the dean's wife and the dean's daughters had been her best
friends, but they were not friends on whom she could be dependent. They
were in no way connected with her by blood. Therefore at the age of
eighteen she had gone out to be a child's governess. Then old Lady Fawn
had heard of her virtues--Lady Fawn who had seven unmarried daughters
running down from seven-and-twenty to thirteen, and Lucy Morris had been
hired to teach English, French, German, and something of music to the two
youngest Misses Fawn.

During that visit at the deanery, when the heir of the Eustaces was being
born, Lucy was undergoing a sort of probation for the Fawn establishment.