Page:A strange, sad comedy (IA strangesadcomedy00seawiala).pdf/290

278 bright smile. Letty was so shocked by Miss Maywood's candor that she stood quite still, and said "Oh!" in a grieved voice, which Miss Maywood took to mean regret at having lost the prize.

"As everybody knows you are engaged to Mr. Farebrother," continued Ethel, still smiling, and twisting off a twig of syringa that was at hand, "you can't grudge me my good fortune."

Grudge her her good fortune! And "everybody" knowing she was engaged to Farebrother, when she had not breathed a word of it outside her own family, albeit she had half her trousseau finished! Letty was so scandalized by Miss Maywood's brazen assurance, as she regarded it, that she could only say, coldly:

"I do not understand how 'everybody' can know that I am engaged to Mr. Farebrother. Certainly I have never mentioned it, and I am sure that he has n't."

"That 's only your odd Southern way," answered Ethel, disapprovingly.

Curiosity got the better of Letty's disgust, and she asked, "How long have you and my cousin been engaged?"

"Only to-day," calmly replied Ethel. "Reg-