— 5 —Mrs. Sacret prayed to god when she first entered the Old Priory that she might be enabled to help her friend, and she used those words when explaining herself to her Dissenting acquaintances. “I am trying to help a friend, who is lonely and not very happy. I do not know how long I shall stay with her.”
No one was interested, she had always been too aloof from the chapel, save when she mentioned her future address, then she saw a gleam of surprise and envy on several dull faces.
They have to admit, she thought, that I have good connections and that I am what I always claimed to be, a gentlewoman.
She resolved to take no money from Olivia; this was to be a visit, no business arrangement. She would stay three months at the Old Priory, then look for a situation, this time from a comfor
