When Susanna came home she did not seem to know much of Mr Rubb, junior, or to care much about him. Old Mr Rubb lived, she knew, near the place of business in the New Road, and sometimes he came to Gower Street, but nobody liked him. She didn’t remember that she had ever seen Mr Rubb, junior, at her mother’s house but once, when he came to dinner. When she was told that Mr Rubb was very anxious to see her, she chucked up her head and said that the man was a goose.

He came, and in a very few minutes he had talked over Susanna. He brought her a little present,—a work-box,—which he had bought for her at Littlebath; and though the work-box itself did not altogether avail, it paved the way for civil words, which were more efficacious. On this occasion he talked more to his partner’s daughter than to his partner’s sister, and promised to tell her mamma how well she was looking, and that the air of Littlebath had brought roses to her cheeks.

“I think it is a healthy place,” said Miss Mackenzie.

“I’m quite sure it is,” said Mr Rubb. “And you like Mrs Crammer’s school, Susanna?”

She would have preferred to have been called Miss Mackenzie, but was not disposed to quarrel with him on the point.

“Yes, I like it very well,” she said. “The other girls are very nice; and if one must go to school, I suppose it’s as good as any other school.”

“Susanna thinks that going to school at all is rather a nuisance,” said Miss Mackenzie.

“You’d think so too, aunt, if you had to practise every day for an hour in the same room with four other pianos. It’s my belief that I shall hate the sound of a piano the longest day that I shall live.”

“I suppose it’s the same with all young ladies,” said Mr Rubb.

“It’s the same with them all at Mrs Crammer’s. There isn’t one there that does not hate it.”

“But you wouldn’t like not to be able to play,” said her aunt.

“Mamma doesn’t play, and you don’t play; and I don’t see what’s the use of it. It won’t make anybody like music to hear four pianos all going at the same time, and all of them out of tune.”

“You must not tell them in Gower Street, Mr Rubb, that Susanna talks like that,” said Miss Mackenzie.

“Yes, you may, Mr Rubb. But you must tell them at the same time that I am quite happy, and that Aunt Margaret is the dearest woman in the world.”

“I’ll be sure to tell them that,” said Mr Rubb. Then he went away, pressing Miss Mackenzie’s hand warmly as he took his leave; and as soon as he was gone, his character was of course discussed.

“He’s quite a different man, aunt, from what I thought; and he’s not at all like old Mr Rubb. Old Mr Rubb, when he comes to drink tea in Gower Street, puts his handkerchief over his knees to catch the crumbs.”