Maids in the kitchen heard that unseemly sound, as they had heard,
awe-struck, the raised voice, and Mrs. Veale felt she must read them a
short but fitting lesson on the dire results of wanting things beyond
one's station. The stout cook and the crisp housemaid soon knew of
Loveday's presumptuous ambition, a knowledge they shared now with the
Lear family and Cherry Cotton, and that soon was to spread to the
accompaniment of many a titter about the twisted ways of the village.
CHAPTER VIII: IN WHICH LOVEDAY CONTINUES
HER QUEST AND ACHIEVES TENPENCE
Chapter VIII
IN WHICH LOVEDAY CONTINUES HER QUEST AND ACHIEVES TENPENCE
Loveday ran down the path to the Vicarage gate so fast that the tears
she had not been able to restrain blew off her cheeks as she went. Thus
it came about that she did not see Miss Letitia until she had all but
knocked her down in the urgency of her flight.
Letitia Veale was no sylph such as Miss Le Pettit, however, and she
caught hold of Loveday like the good-natured, rather romping, young lady
that she was. Mrs. Veale always said of her that she would "fine down,"
but persons less well disposed to her than her own mother, and who were
the mothers of daughters themselves, said that Letitia Veale was a sad
hoyden. She had ever a merry nod or word for Loveday, and dazed with
anger as that ill-balanced maid was, Letitia's smile won her to
comparative calm again, though it was a calm with which cunning
intermingled.
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