“If there is anything in it, it will really be awful, Owen. No, I’m not meaning anything nasty! Awful for the girl, and also for us. I expect she wears no stockings, and says ‘bedad’ and ‘begorra.’”
“These matters can easily be remedied. You will be good to her, won’t you, Lottie?”
“Of course. I will be good to any one belonging to you,” she answered. Then, suddenly getting out of the hammock, with a great display of orange silk petticoat, and standing before him, she added, “But I feel confident it is some mistake. And if not, do think of the feelings of Dudley Deverill, brought up to be your heir.”
“Well, he will have the title and a good share of the property. But we are travelling a little too fast. I must first go over to Glenveigh. I might have kept my own counsel till I returned; but I thought you’d like to know.”
“Like to know!” she repeated, under her breath.
“Pray don’t let it go any further. I’ve not told even Elgitha. Say I’m called away on urgent business.”
“And the word ‘business,’ like charity, covers a multitude of sins and secrets!” Lady Mulgrave looked at her husband with an odd smile; but he was grave—he was even agitated. She could read the signs. He had been besotted about his first wife, so people declared, though it seemed incredible, for he was always so cool, self-possessed, and undemonstrative. Was he going to be as idiotic with respect to his daughter?
But of course half the evils in the world are those which never happen. No doubt this creature was a myth.
“At least it will be an adventure,” she exclaimed. “And think of the scare lines in the morning papers: ‘Long-lost heiress discovered in Irish cabin.’ ‘Peasant girl, aged twenty, a peer’s daughter.’”