The next opening of the door brought something more welcome:
it was for the tea-things, which she had begun almost
to despair of seeing that evening. Susan and an
attendant girl, whose inferior appearance informed Fanny,
to her great surprise, that she had previously seen the
upper servant, brought in everything necessary for the meal;
Susan looking, as she put the kettle on the fire and glanced
at her sister, as if divided between the agreeable triumph
of shewing her activity and usefulness, and the dread
of being thought to demean herself by such an office.
"She had been into the kitchen," she said, "to hurry Sally
and help make the toast, and spread the bread and butter,
or she did not know when they should have got tea,
and she was sure her sister must want something after
her journey."
Fanny was very thankful. She could not but own that she
should be very glad of a little tea, and Susan immediately
set about making it, as if pleased to have the employment
all to herself; and with only a little unnecessary bustle,
and some few injudicious attempts at keeping her brothers
in better order than she could, acquitted herself very well.
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