"What was that ?" "I said nothing," stammered my Cousin Dolly's voice.
Well; there was a to-do.

The fellow beneath called out to Mr.Harris, who was upstairs; and I heard him come down.

My Cousin Dolly was sobbing and crying out, and so was the maid Nancy to whom she had spoken.

At first I could make nothing of it, nor why she had said what she had; and then, as I heard them all go into the parlour together, I understood that if my Cousin Tom had been shrewd, his daughter had been shrewder; and had said what she had, knowing that a man was within earshot.
But there was nothing for me to do but to lie there still; for I could hear nothing from the parlour but a confused sound of voices, now three or four speaking at once, now a man's voice (which I took to be the magistrate's), and now, I thought my Cousin Dolly's.

I heard, too, above me, my Cousin Tom speaking very angrily, and understood that he was kept from his daughter--which was the best thing in the world for me, since he might very well have spoiled the whole design.