Page:Traits and Trials.pdf/218

212 fellow servants, set off to fetch the unfortunate girl. Hastily cautioning her against telling the melancholy intelligence till her young mistress was in the carriage, and there to communicate it as gently as possible, Mrs. Cameron broke off her discourse, for, in less time than had seemed possible, Fanny came down equipped for her journey. A hasty embrace, a few broken words, and a faltering "God bless you, my poor dear child," from her governess, and Fanny found herself driving off with a rapidity that added to the confusion of her ideas.

"Can they not drive faster?" exclaimed she in an agony of fear.

"Lord, Miss, it is of no use now," said the servant. Fanny sprang from her seat, she looked almost doubtfully in the face of her attendant: it confirmed her worst terror, and she sank back insensible. It were needlessly painful to enter into the detail of that miserable journey, but all that Fanny had previously endured seemed as nothing when she drove into the street where