Lady Bell, Volume 1 by Sarah Tytler

The white hoar frost which had given a fairy-like beauty to the old / orchard trees of Nutfield had long melted away, and was replaced by the / first powdering and fluttering of green on the grey gnarled boughs.

The birds which Lady Bell had fed no longer came hopping to door and / windowsill, but, independent of her bounty, and forgetful of past / favours, broke off the acquaintance, and gave themselves up to / satisfactory poking for worms in the soft earth, to energetic pecking at / the first midges and green flies, and to the absorbing delights of / pairing.

Summer company might be anticipated to fill the spare rooms at Nutfield. / But Miss Kingscote, though not so graceful and winning in her ways as / Lady Bell's feathered friends, was more faithful, and less carried away / by the claims of her personal history, in the association which had / remained unbroken since Lady Bell had communicated the fact of her / marriage.

Miss Kingscote made up her mind to retain Mrs. Barlowe as a companion, / "for, Lud! I've growed fond of her. " Miss Kingscote told herself in a / succession of reflections, "it would cost me summat to part with her. / Besides, what would become of the wench herself, as is pure genteel and / dandily, though she do have the smartest fingers, and the prettiest / devices, if she were cast out into the world, may be to be driven back / on the tender mercies of her villain of a man. I do have a spite at them / men; except my Master Charles-he's a good sort, as well as a pretty / fellow, to make his sister's heart glad, and other lasses' hearts sad. / But this lass she knows that she and Master Charles can't at no price / come together, since she's neither a rank fool nor a base hussy, and / he's not an abandoned rakish rascal, God bless him! She's a safe / playfellow for Master Charles, as well as good company for me.

"She'll help me in the knotted fringes for the curtains of them beds. / She has begun covers for the spare chairs, which ain't half finished, / and which I could no more complete all alone than I could dance a / minnuee. I want a hand, too, in the sets out when the folks staying in / the house step in to sup with Master Charles and me; and I am no great / shakes at the preserving and pickling which summer do bring on heavy, / since old nursey would never let me try, so long as she could have a / finger in the pie. I can prank myself fine enough, but Master Charles / he's besotted with the last modes, and he lays into me to take Mrs. / Barlowe's word in the matter. Well, I'm not misdoubting that, / wheresoever, and at whatsoever loss the poor thrown-away thing learnt / it, she knows the fashions of the top company."

Thus Lady Bell lived on at Nutfield, and shared the agreeable stir which / followed the first announcement of the season of lodgers to the house.

"It's the mayor's wife have sent out a messenger express that the rooms / are wanted for a Lon'on lady the mayor knows on (we only make our house / free to friends and friends' friends, Mrs. Barlowe), a young madam newly / lain in with her first child, and seeking quiet and country air to / recruit her," was Miss Kingscote's important tidings.

"Our air is as sweet as a nut," Miss Kingscote animadverted in her / satisfaction, "as your colour may show. When you came first I could / compare you to nought for wanness but the puling white July flower, and / now you are getting that rosy you'll soon match its red brother and / sister."

Only one word of the news kept tingling in Lady Bell's ears, "Lon'on! " / Could this lady be high enough in rank to know any member of Lady / Lucie's old set? Might the stranger, after they had been several weeks / together, be induced to favour and help Lady Bell, if she revealed her / identity and appealed to the new-comer's benevolence?

She knew that she could not live at Nutfield always. Nay, she was / determined against remaining there for any length of time. However / hazardous a farther encounter with the world, she would face it, rather / than sink into slothful apathy and degeneracy, and be dragged down at / last to Miss Kingscote's clownish level.

The next information was brought by Miss Kingscote after she had been to / Lumley and seen the mayor's wife. It struck more home where Lady Bell / was concerned.

"Murder! how comes it," cried Miss Kingscote, not waiting to divest / herself of her yellow pelisse and her hat tied down over her lappets, / but sitting brandishing a whip, to the danger of Lady Bell's eyes, on / the first chair which Miss Kingscote could drop into after coming back / to her own parlour, "that Nutfield should be a refuge for distressed / wives? Sure Master Charles and me is neither husband nor wife, that we / should draw such a lot, like honey draws flies. Our lodger to be, is / parted from her husband too! though they do say it is by her own doing. / She were a great fortune, and he were a grand beau, and they pulled / together none so amiss for a time. But he ran mad for play, as the Lord / deliver Master Charles from running, which led him into all sorts of / evil courses."

"Ah, well-a-day. And was there no remedy? " besought Lady Bell, greatly / interested.

"Ne'er a one. For a few weeks gone, just afore the child came into this / weary world, when its father's heart might have been tender, he clean / kicked over the traces. He had vowed and swore Bible oaths that he would / leave off play, more by token her fortune were none of his; but he went / and staked a part on't with a Warwickshire gentleman, a known gambler / and cheat-I'se warrant on his last legs, one Squire Godwin."

"Ah! " exclaimed Lady Bell again, more shrilly this time; but Miss / Kingscote took no notice of the peculiar cadence of the voice, or only / attributed it to her own eloquence and the pathos of her story.