rl. Why do you hide your hair, and wear such a
dowdy, high gown, Julia?

JULIA.--You mustn't call me Julia, Captain Touchit.

TOUCHIT.--Why? when I lived in your mother's lodging, I called you
Julia. When you brought up the tea, you didn't mind being called Julia.
When we used to go to the play with the tickets the Editor gave us, who
lived on the second floor--

JULIA.--The wretch!--don't speak of him!

TOUCHIT.--Ah! I am afraid he was a sad deceiver, that Editor. He was
a very clever fellow. What droll songs he used to sing! What a heap of
play-tickets, diorama-tickets, concert-tickets, he used to give you! Did
he touch your heart, Julia?

JULIA.--Fiddlededee! No man ever touched my heart, Captain Touchit.

TOUCHIT.--What! not even Tom Flight, who had the second floor after the
Editor left it--and who cried so bitterly at the idea of going out to
India without you? You had a tendre for him--a little passion--you know
you had. Why, even the ladies here know it. Mrs. Bonnington told me that
you were waiting for a sweetheart in India to whom you were engaged; and
Lady Kicklebury thinks you are dying in love for the absent swain.

JULIA.--I hope--I hope--you did not contradict them, Captain Touchit.

TOUCHIT.--Why not, my dear?

JULIA.--May I be frank with you? You were a kind, very kind friend to
us--to me, in my youth.

TOUCHIT.--I paid my lodgings regularly, and my bills without asking
questions. I never weighed the tea in the caddy, or counted the lumps of
sugar, or heeded the rapid consumption of my liqueur--

JULIA.--Hush, hush! I know they were taken. I know you were very good to
us. You helped my poor papa out of many a difficulty.

TOUCHIT [aside].--Tipsy old coal-merchant! I did, and he helped himself
too.

JULIA.--And you were always our best friend, Captain Touchit. When our
misfortunes came, you got me this situation with Mrs. Milliken--and,
and--don't you see?--

TOUCHIT.--Well--what?

JULIA [laughing].--I think it is best, under the circumstances, that the
ladies here should suppose I am engaged to be married--or or, they might
be--might be jealous, you understand. Women are sometimes jealous of
others,--especially mothers and mothers-in-law.

TOUCHIT.--Oh, you arch schemer! And it is for that you cover up that
beautiful hair of yours, and wear that demure cap?

JULIA [slyly].--I am subject to rheumatism in the head, Captain Touchit.

TOUCHIT.--It is for that you put on the spectacles,