Lydia listened with interest, and after a little further talk with Mrs. Arbuthnot she went away to her household duties. But all the time she was wondering what Mrs. Arbuthnot was really like. She might be a pretty, helpless butterfly, she might really be a quite sensible, competent woman, who between an adoring husband and a practical sister-in-law had resigned herself to doing nothing in particular—and doing it very well, thought Lydia.
By eleven o’clock Mrs. Arbuthnot was dressed, packed for, and ready to start. Miss Arbuthnot was a few minutes late, excusing herself for the delay because she had found what looked like a red nitwit’s nest in the water-meadow, but it turned out to be only a lesser clawhammer. The journey to Southbridge was soon accomplished. By previous arrangement they
