"What have you been doing all this morning?" asked my lady. "Not wasting your time, I hope?"
"No, my lady, I have been altering the blue dress. It is rather dark on this side of the house, so I took it up to my own room, and worked at the window."
The girl was leaving the room as she spoke, but she turned around and looked at Lady Audley as if waiting for further orders.
Lucy looked up at the same moment, and the eyes of the two women met.
"Phoebe Marks," said my lady, throwing herself into an easy-chair, and trifling with the wild flowers in her lap, "you are a good, industrious girl, and while I live and am prosperous, you shall never want a firm friend or a twenty-pound note."