Back To Billabong, page 59 by Mary Grant Bruce
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might hasten her stepmother's journey. "When do you go?"
"The day after to-morrow. I'll stay there a few days, I suppose; not worth going so far for only one evening. Mind, Cecilia, you're not to have Bob here while I'm away. When I come back, if I'm satisfied with you, I'll see about asking him again."
"That is very good of you," said the girl slowly.
"Well, that's all right--you hurry and get ready; there's always a chance they may have sold out, because it was a bargain line, and if they have you'll have to try other places. I don't know what on earth I'll do if you can't match it." She turned to go, and then hesitated. "I was thinking you might take Avice with you--but you'll get about quicker alone, and she isn't ready. The tubes and buses are that crowded it's no catch to take a child about with you." In moments of excitement Mrs. Rainham's English was apt to slip from her. At other times she cultivated it carefully, assisted by a dramatic class, which an enthusiastic maiden lady, with leanings towards the stage, conducted each winter among neighbouring kindred souls.
Cecilia had caught her breath in alarm, but she breathed a sigh of relief as the stout, over-dressed figure went down the narrow stairs, with a final injunction to hurry. There was, indeed, no need to give Cecilia that particular command. She scribbled one word, "Coming," on Bob's note, thrust it into an envelope and addressed it hastily, and then tapped on the wall between the servants' room and her own.
Eliza appeared with the swiftness of a Jack-in-the-box, full of suppressed excitement.
"Lor! I fought she was never goin'," she breathed. "Got it ready, Miss? The boy'll fink I've gorn an' eloped wiv it." She took the envelope and pattered swiftly downstairs.
A very few moments saw Cecilia flying in her wake--to Balding's first, as quickly as tube and motor-bus could combine to take her, since she dared not breathe freely until Mrs. Rainham's commission had been settled. Balding's had never se