"It will not be much trouble to me if Sophia finds you a maid," said her father drily; "and as to the expense, which is what I suppose you were going to allude to, I am quite well able to afford it. Otherwise I should not have proposed such a thing."
Lesley felt herself snubbed, and did not like it, but again kept silence.
"I cannot promise you much amusement while you stay here," Mr. Brooke went on, "but anything that you like to see or hear when you are in town can be easily provided for. I mean in the way of picture galleries, concerts, theatres—things of that kind. Your Aunt Sophia will probably be too much occupied to take you to such places; but if you have a maid you will be pretty independent. I wonder she did not think of it herself. Of course a maid can go about with you, and so relieve her mind."
"I am sorry to be troublesome," said Lesley, stiffly.
He cast an amused glance at her. "You won't trouble me, my dear. And Mrs. Romaine says that she will call and make your acquaintance. I dare say you will find her a help to you."
"Is she—a friend of yours?"
"A very old friend," said Caspar Brooke, with decision. "Then there are the Kenyons, who live opposite. Ethel Kenyon is a clever girl—a great favorite of mine. Her brother is a doctor."
"And she lives with him and keeps his house?" said Lesley, growing interested.
"Well, she lives with him. I don't know that she does much in the way of keeping his house. I hope I shall not shock your prejudices"—how did he know that she had any prejudices?—"if I tell you that she is an actress."
"An actress!"—Lesley flushed with surprise, even with a little horror, though at the same moment she was conscious of a movement of pleasant curiosity and a desire to know what an actress was like in private life.