ourse I am;--one has to be afraid. A single lady can't go about
and do just as she likes, as a man can do, or a married woman."

"I don't know about a man; but I think a single woman ought to be
able to do more what she likes than a married woman. Suppose Mrs
Stumfold found that I had got old Lady Ruff to meet her, what could
she do to me?"

Old Lady Ruff was supposed to be the wickedest old card-player in all
Littlebath, and there were strange stories afloat of the things she
had done. There were Stumfoldians who declared that she had been
seen through the blinds teaching her own maid piquet on a Sunday
afternoon; but any horror will get itself believed nowadays. How
could they have known that it was not beggar-my-neighbour? But piquet
was named because it is supposed in the Stumfoldian world to be the
wickedest of all games.

"I don't suppose she'd do much," said Miss Baker; "no doubt she would
be very much offended."

"Why shouldn't I try to convert Lady Ruff?"

"She's over eighty, my dear."

"But I suppose she's not past all hope. The older one is the more one
ought to try. But, of course, I'm only joking about her. Would Miss
Todd come if you were to ask her?"

"Perhaps she would, but I don't think she'd be comfortable; or if she
were, she'd make the others uncomfortable. She always does exactly
what she pleases."

"That's just why I think I should like her. I wish I dared to do what
I pleased! We all of us are such cowards. Only that I don't dare, I'd
go off to Australia and marry a sheep farmer."

"You would not like him when you'd got him;--you'd find him very
rough."

"I shouldn't mind a bit about his being rough. I'd marry a shoe-black
to-morrow if I thought I could make him happy, and he could make me
happy."

"But it wouldn't make you happy."

"Ah! that's just what we don't know. I shan't marry a shoe-black,
because I don't dare. So you think I'd better not ask Miss Todd.
Perhaps she wouldn't get on well with Mr Maguire."

"I had them both together once, my dear, and she made herself quite
unbearable. You've no idea what kind of things she can say."

"I should have thought Mr Maguire would have given her as good as she
brought," said Miss Mackenzie.

"So he did; and then Miss Todd got up and left him, saying out loud,
before all the company, that it was not fair for him to come and
preach sermons in such a place as that. I don't think they have ever
met since."

All this made Miss Mack