and is not a lady whose name is unknown coming to live in it? A nice neighbour for you, Mrs. Hopkinson."
"Oh, gracious goodness, Willis, you don't mean to say that Lord Chester is going to establish his mistress next door, and our back staircase looking on the lawn—in Dulham too! Such a quiet, proper place! Let me have another look at that dreadful paper! It must be so. What shall I do?"
"Bear the misfortune, ma'am—cheerfully as I do. Luckily my house is half a mile off."
"And we are under the very roof of Pleasance. I'll have the shutters of that staircase window shut and barred at once; the house will be as dark as pitch, but that can't be helped. Good bye, Willis, I must be off to take my precautions. This is a business!"
Willis carried off his paper with something that would have been a smile if he had not been Willis, and Mrs. Hopkinson set to work to throw up her fortifications against the vices of the nobility.
