Page:Saxe Holm's Stories, Series Two.djvu/324

314 no. "Ye-es, it s a very handsome invitation, certain; nobody can dispute that; but it seems queer he should want to invite folks he don't know any thing about. It 's bounden queer, I think. Let me see the letter." Captain 'Lisha straightened his spectacles on his nose, and read the letter through very slowly. Then he folded it and laid it on the table, and brought down his hand hard on it, and said again: "It 's bounden queer."

Tilly said nothing.

"What 's the matter with you?" said her mother, a little sharply. "What 's your notion about it."

Tilly laughed an odd little laugh.

"He 's got the idea I 'm a little girl," she said. "I see it just as plain as anything. That 's what makes him write 's he does."

"No such a thing, Tilly," said Mrs. Bennet, in an excited tone. "What makes you think so? I 'm sure I don't see it."

It was an instinct rather than a specific interpretation of any one sentence which had made Tilly so sure; she could hardly justify it to her mother, though it was clear enough to herself; so she replied, meekly:—

"I don't know."

Mrs. Bennet snatched the letter, and exclaimed: "I 'll read it again! It 's the silliest notion I ever heard of. I don't see what put it into your head, Matilda Bennet!"

Tilly said nothing. On a second reading of the tetter, Mrs. Bennet was more vehement than ever.