Good Heaven, said I to myself, give me courage to stand before this
naughty master! O soften him, or harden me!
Come in, fool, said he, angrily, as soon as he saw me; (and snatched my
hand with a pull;) you may well be ashamed to see me, after your noise
and nonsense, and exposing me as you have done. I ashamed to see you!
thought I: Very pretty indeed!--But I said nothing.
Mrs. Jervis, said he, here you are both together. Do you sit down; but
let her stand, if she will. Ay, thought I, if I can; for my knees beat
one against the other. Did you not think, when you saw the girl in the
way you found her in, that I had given her the greatest occasion for
complaint, that could possibly be given to a woman? And that I had
actually ruined her, as she calls it? Tell me, could you think any thing
less? Indeed, said she, I feared so at first. Has she told you what I
did to her, and all I did to her, to occasion all this folly, by which my
reputation might have suffered in your opinion, and in that of all the
family.--Inform me, what she has told you?
She was a little too much frightened, as she owned afterwards, at his
sternness, and said, Indeed she told me you only pulled her on your knee,
and kissed her.
Then I plucked up my spirits a little.
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