Mary Anne laid down her work, rose, hooked herself behind, as being under catechization, and replied: “No, it is a corruption, Miss Peecher.”
“Who gave her that name?” Miss Peecher was going on, from the mere force of habit, when she checked herself; on Mary Anne’s evincing theological impatience to strike in with her godfathers and her godmothers, and said: “I mean of what name is it a corruption?”
“Elizabeth, or Eliza, Miss Peecher.”
“Right, Mary Anne. Whether there were any Lizzies in the early Christian Church must be considered very doubtful, very doubtful.” Miss Peecher was exceedingly sage here. “Speaking correctly, we say, then, that Hexam’s sister is called Lizzie; not that she is named so. Do we not, Mary Anne?”
“We do, Miss Peecher.”
“And where,” pursued Miss Peecher, complacent in her little transparent fiction of conducting the examination in a semiofficial manner for Mary Anne’s benefit, not her own, “where does this young woman, who is called but not named Lizzie, live? Think, now, before answering.”
“In Church Street, Smith Square, by Mill Bank, ma’am.”
“In Church Street, Smith Square, by Mill Bank,” repeated Miss Peecher, as if possessed beforehand of the book in which it was written. “Exactly so. And what occupation does this young woman pursue, Mary Anne? Take time.”
“She has a place of trust at an outfitter’s in the City, ma’am.”
“Oh!” said Miss Peecher, pondering on it; but smoothly added, in a confirmatory tone, “At an outfitter’s in the City. Ye‑es?”