Miss Matty thought he was alive. I would
make further inquiry.
CHAPTER XII--ENGAGED TO BE MARRIED
Was the "poor Peter" of Cranford the Aga Jenkyns of Chunderabaddad,
or was he not? As somebody says, that was the question.
In my own home, whenever people had nothing else to do, they blamed
me for want of discretion. Indiscretion was my bug-bear fault.
Everybody has a bug-bear fault, a sort of standing characteristic--
a piece de resistance for their friends to cut at; and in general
they cut and come again. I was tired of being called indiscreet
and incautious; and I determined for once to prove myself a model
of prudence and wisdom. I would not even hint my suspicions
respecting the Aga. I would collect evidence and carry it home to
lay before my father, as the family friend of the two Miss
Jenkynses.
In my search after facts, I was often reminded of a description my
father had once given of a ladies' committee that he had had to
preside over. He said he could not help thinking of a passage in
Dickens, which spoke of a chorus in which every man took the tune
he knew best, and sang it to his own satisfaction. So, at this
charitable committee, every lady took the subject uppermost in her
mind, and talked about it to her own great contentment, but not
much to the advancement of the subject they had met to discuss.
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