“Ay, you come to me when you want something. That’s the old story.”
Neaera remembered that Mrs. Bort had often taken her own view of what the supplicant wanted, and given something quite other than what was asked; but, in spite of this unpromising opening, she persevered, and laid before Mrs. Bort a dazzling picture of the grandeur waiting her at Glentarroch.
“And I shall be so much obliged. Really, I don’t know what the servants—the girls, especially—may be doing.”
“Carryings-on, I’ll be bound,” said Mrs. Bort. “Why don’t you go yourself, Nery?”
“Oh, I can’t, indeed. I—I must stay in London.”
“Nasty, cold, dull little place it sounds,” said Mrs. Bort.
“Oh, of course I shall consider all that——”
“He—he!” Mrs. Bort sniggered unpleasantly. “So it ain’t sech a sweet spot, as ye call it, after all?”
Neaera recovered herself without dignity, and stated that she thought of forty pounds a year and all found.