'Fat, funny little Lieutenant Puddock!--was ever so diverting a
disgrace? Oh! dear aunt, what have I done to deserve so prodigious a
suspicion?'
It was plain, from her heightened colour, that her aunt did not choose
to be laughed at.
'What have you done?' said she, quite briskly; 'why--what have you
done?' and Aunt Becky had to consider just for a second or two, staring
straight at the young lady through the crimson damask curtains. 'You
have--you--you--why, what have you _done_? and she covered her confusion
by stooping down to adjust the heel of her slipper.
'Oh! it's delightful--plump little Lieutenant Puddock!' and the graver
her aunt looked the more irrepressibly she laughed; till that lady,
evidently much offended, took the young gentlewoman pretty roundly to
task.
'Well! I'll tell you what you have done,' said she, almost fiercely. 'As
absurd as he is, you have been twice as sweet upon him as he upon you;
and you have done your endeavour to fill his brain with the notion that
you are in love with him, young lady; and if you're not, you have acted,
I promise you, a most unscrupulous and unpardonable part by a most
honourable and well-bred gentleman--for that character I believe he
bears.
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