Then the Duchess signified her pleasure that her cheek should be
touched,--and it was touched. "Mrs. Pepper will show you your room.
It is the same you had when you were here before. Perhaps you know
that Mr. Green comes down to Stamford on the first, and that he
will dine here on that day and on Sunday."
"That will be very nice. He had told me how it was arranged."
"It seems that he knows one of the clergymen in Stamford, and will
stay at his house. Perhaps you will like to go upstairs now."
That was all there was, and that had not been very bad. During the
entire week the Duchess hardly spoke to her another word, and
certainly did not speak to her a word in private. Arabella now
could go where she pleased without any danger of meeting her aunt
on her walks. When Sunday came nobody asked her to go to church.
She did go twice, Mounser Green accompanying her to the morning
service;--but there was no restraint. The Duchess only thought of
her as a disagreeable ill-conducted incubus, who luckily was about
to be taken away to Patagonia.
It had been settled on all sides that the marriage was to be very
quiet. The bride was of course consulted about her bridesmaids, as
to whom there was a little difficulty. But a distant Trefoil was
found willing to act, in payment for the unaccustomed invitation to
Mistletoe, and one Connop Green young lady, with one De Browne
young lady, and one Smijth young lady came on the same terms.
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