"And you don't live at Gateshead?"
"I live at the lodge: the old porter has left."
"Well, and how do they all get on? Tell me everything about them,
Bessie: but sit down first; and, Bobby, come and sit on my knee,
will you?" but Bobby preferred sidling over to his mother.
"You're not grown so very tall, Miss Jane, nor so very stout,"
continued Mrs. Leaven. "I dare say they've not kept you too well at
school: Miss Reed is the head and shoulders taller than you are;
and Miss Georgiana would make two of you in breadth."
"Georgiana is handsome, I suppose, Bessie?"
"Very. She went up to London last winter with her mama, and there
everybody admired her, and a young lord fell in love with her: but
his relations were against the match; and--what do you think?--he
and Miss Georgiana made it up to run away; but they were found out
and stopped. It was Miss Reed that found them out: I believe she
was envious; and now she and her sister lead a cat and dog life
together; they are always quarrelling--"
"Well, and what of John Reed?"
"Oh, he is not doing so well as his mama could wish. He went to
college, and he got--plucked, I think they call it: and then his
uncles wanted him to be a barrister, and study the law: but he is
such a dissipated young man, they will never make much of him, I
think."
"What does he look like?"
"He is very tall: some people call him a fine-looking young man;
but he has such thick lips."
"And Mrs. Reed?"
"Missis looks stout and well enough in the face, but I think she's
not quite easy in her mind: Mr. John's conduct does not please her-
-he spends a deal of money."
"Did she send you here, Bessie?"
"No, indeed: but I have long wanted to see you, and when I heard
that there had been a letter from you, and that you were going to
another part of the country, I thought I'd just set of, and get a
look at you before you were quite out of my reach."
"I am afraid you are disappointed in me, Bessie." I said this
laughing: I perceived that Bessie's glance, though it expressed
regard, did in no shape denote admiration.
"No, Miss Jane, not exactly: you are genteel enough; you look like
a lady, and it is as much as ever I expected of you: you were no
beauty as a child."