There were other less well-known cousins of mine, one of whom my mother had invited to make short stays with me some six years back. I did not care much for her, as she was a town girl, with ideas and pursuits altogether different from mine, and I remembered being offended with her for sneering, as I thought, at my 'beetle and pebble hunting' occupations, which to her were tiresome and uninteresting. Somehow her name came into my head-Lucia Lovete-and it was to her that Mr Penwick wrote. Lucia had lost her parents when very young; like myself, she was an only child, and she lived at Sunninghill with another cousin a little older than herself, Gladys Spendwell. In my heart I thought Lucia would never care to come, and I really hoped she would not. I was in that morbidly unhealthy frame of mind when it seems unbearable to have to speak to others. The only person I cared to see was dear old Martha, for she would cry with me, though she too, scolded me for not trying to bear up better.

But Lucia came: the moment she heard the dreadful tidings she left all her joys behind her, packed up a trunk and came as quick as steam and horseflesh would bring her. Nothing could exceed her gentle, sweet, sympathising manner. She took my heart by storm. It is true she was the means of making my tears gush forth again, but they were not the same bitter tears of desolation and despair, for I felt I had in her a true, supporting heart to lean on. Poor old Martha had indeed given me hers; but she was old, and Lucia was new and more of my age, being nineteen whilst I was sixteen. So to Lucia I clung. Shall I tell you what she was like? Lucia was just a little above the middle height for girls. She had a most lovely figure, with beautiful arms, hands and feet. The lines of her bosom were singularly beautiful, for she was full there without being too plump, and her breasts seemed like living things.