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 This general lack of interest in her made her task much easier: none the less, it was a difficult one for a child of twelve. There were so many things to learn—the names of the dogs and the servants, of Lady Salkeld's cats; her way about the court; the places in which Marion kept her possessions. She had to learn them without letting any one of the family or the servants perceive that she was learning them. The need for perpetual wariness was trying.

Now and again, of course, in spite of the faithfulness with which she followed the instructions of the Honorable John Ruffin to let other people do the talking, she did make a slip, displaying an ignorance of some familiar fact which should have astounded those about her. It was fortunate, indeed, that she had to do with unobservant persons. The servants were her chief danger; and she felt it. By the circumstances of their life they had to be more observant. But with them the Honorable John Ruffin's other injunction to be a red Deeping and give herself airs, stood her in good stead. They, too, were not interested in Marion, and though they noticed this change, it was not of a kind to awake