'It's jolly polite anyhow, isn't it Maud?' said Milly, who had conned it
over, and accepted it as a model composition.
I must have been, I think, naturally a rather shrewd girl; and considering
how very little I had seen of the world--nothing in fact--I often wonder
now at the sage conclusions at which I arrived.
Were I to answer this handsome and cunning fool according to his folly,
in what position should I find myself? No doubt my reply would induce
a rejoinder, and that compel another note from me, and that invite yet
another from him; and however his might improve in warmth, they were sure
not to abate. Was it his impertinent plan, with this show of respect and
ceremony, to drag me into a clandestine correspondence? Inexperienced girl
as I was, I fired at the idea of becoming his dupe, and fancying, perhaps,
that there was more in merely answering his note than it would have
amounted to, I said--
'That kind of thing may answer very well with button-makers, but ladies
don't like it. What would your papa think of it if he found that I had been
writing to him, and seeing him without his permission? If he wanted to
see me he could have'--(I really did not know exactly what he could have
done)--'he could have timed his visit to Lady Knollys differently; at all
events, he has no right to place me in an embarrassing situation, and I am
certain Cousin Knollys would say so; and I think his note both shabby and
impertinent.
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