prince in your drawing-room."

"Lucy, you astonish me."

"But it is so. Dear Lady Fawn, don't look like that. I know how good you
are to me. I know you let me do things which other governesses mayn't do;
and say things; but still I am a governess, and I know I misbehaved--to
you." Then Lucy burst into tears.

Lady Fawn, in whose bosom there was no stony corner or morsel of hard
iron, was softened at once. "My dear, you are more like another daughter
to me than anything else."

"Dear Lady Fawn!"

"But it makes me unhappy when I see your mind engaged about Mr. Greystock.
There is the truth, Lucy. You should not think of Mr. Greystock. Mr.
Greystock is a man who has his way to make in the world, and could not
marry you, even if, under other circumstances, he would wish to do so. You
know how frank I am with you, giving you credit for honest, sound good
sense. To me and to my girls, who know you as a lady, you are as dear a
friend as though you were--anything you may please to think. Lucy Morris
is to us our own dear, dear little friend Lucy. But Mr. Greystock, who is
a member of Parliament, could not marry a governess."

"But I love him so dearly," said Lucy, getting up from her chair, "that
his slightest word is to me more than all the words of all the world
beside. It is no use, Lady Fawn. I do love him, and I don't mean to try to
give it up." Lady Fawn stood silent for a moment, and then suggested that
it would be better for them both to go to bed. During that minute she had