“Don’t talk about presuming, Ma, for goodness’ sake. A girl who is old enough to be engaged, is quite old enough to object to be stared at as if she was a clock.”
“Audacious one!” said Mrs. Wilfer. “Your grandmamma, if so addressed by one of her daughters, at any age, would have insisted on her retiring to a dark apartment.”
“My grandmamma,” returned Lavvy, folding her arms and leaning back in her chair, “wouldn’t have sat staring people out of countenance, I think.”
“She would!” said Mrs. Wilfer.
“Then it’s a pity she didn’t know better,” said Lavvy. “And if my grandmamma wasn’t in her dotage when she took to insisting on people’s retiring to dark apartments, she ought to have been. A pretty exhibition my grandmamma must have made of herself! I wonder whether she ever insisted on people’s retiring into the ball of St. Paul’s; and if she