Iris sat down, feeling rather frightened, but yet as though the worst were over; at any rate she had nothing more to confess.
“I invited you here,” began Mrs Fotheringham, speaking very slowly and impressively, “with a certain object in view, and that was that I might judge whether it would be possible to offer to adopt you altogether. Had I done so it would have been an untold advantage to you in many ways, and a great relief to your parents, for your future would have been provided for. You have plainly shown me, however, that it would be impossible to have you here. You have shown selfish disregard for my comfort, disobedience, and low vulgar tastes. This last escapade has decided me. Your chance is over.”
“What chance?” asked Iris, who had not altogether grasped her meaning.
“Your chance of living here at Paradise Court, and of being rich, instead of going back to Albert Street, where you will always be miserably poor, and have to work for your living.”
“Oh, but anyhow,” said Iris, now quite roused, “I couldn’t possibly do that. I mean, I couldn’t live here even if you liked me.”
“Why not?”
“Why, of course I couldn’t. How could I possibly leave father and mother and the others? They wouldn’t like it either.”
“You like Albert Street better than this, I suppose,” said Mrs Fotheringham coldly.
“Oh, dear, yes—much. As long as the others are there.”
“You won’t like it best always,” said Mrs Fotheringham. “There will come a time when you’ll remember that you’ve missed a chance. Why, you foolish child,” she continued, speaking more earnestly and with a tone of half pity, “you don’t know what money can do. It can do everything. If you are cold it can warm you, if you are dull it can amuse you, if you are hungry it can feed you, if you are insignificant it can make you a power in the world. It can bring people to your feet, and make them serve you.”