Chapter 16 - Page 2

and blushed.

"I shall not say 'Octavia' to grandmamma."

Then suddenly she glanced up at him.

"That is sly, isn't it?" she said. "Sometimes I think I am very sly,
though I am sure it is not my nature to be so. I would rather be open
and candid."

"It would be better," he remarked.

"You think so?" she asked eagerly.

He could not help smiling.

"Do you ever tell untruths to Lady Theobald?" he inquired. "If you do, I
shall begin to be alarmed."

"I act them," she said, blushing more deeply. "I really do--paltry sorts
of untruths, you know; pretending to agree with her when I don't;
pretending to like things a little when I hate them. I have been trying
to improve myself lately, and once or twice it has made her very angry.
She says I am disobedient and disrespectful. She asked me, one day, if it
was my intention to emulate Miss Octavia Bassett. That was when I said I
could not help feeling that I had wasted time in practising."

She sighed softly as she ended.

In the mean time Octavia had Mr. Poppleton and Mr. Francis Barold upon
her hands, and was endeavoring to do her duty as hostess by both of them.
If it had been her intention to captivate these gentlemen, she could not
have complained that Mr. Poppleton was wary or difficult game. His first
fears allayed, his downward path was smooth, and rapid in proportion.
When he had taken his departure with the little silk purse in his
keeping, he had carried under his clerical vest a warmed and thrilled
heart. It was a heart which, it must be confessed, was of the most
inexperienced and susceptible nature. A little man of affectionate and
gentle disposition, he had been given from his earliest youth to
indulging in timid dreams of mild future bliss,--of bliss represented by
some lovely being whose ideals were similar to his own, and who preferred
the wealth of a true affection to the glitter of the giddy throng. Upon
one or two occasions, he had even worshipped from afar; but as on each of
these occasions his hopes had been nipped in the bud by the union of
their object with some hollow worldling, his dream had, so far, never
attained very serious proportions. Since he had taken up his abode in
Slowbridge, he had felt himself a little overpowered by circumstances. It
had been a source of painful embarrassment to him, to find his innocent
presence capable of producing confusion in the breasts of young ladies
who were certainly not more guileless than himself. He had been conscious
that the Misses Egerton did not continue their conversation with freedom
when he chanced to approach the group they graced; and he had observed