“I have only been here two weeks,” stammered the poor bride; “and of course I am not accustomed to all this grandeur yet. I shall get on all right by and by.”
But Mrs. Fenchurch had her doubts. How the agreeable, genial Blagdon seemed to have altered! He now treated her with marked coolness, rarely addressed her, and when she praised Letty, received her encomiums in gloomy silence. After all, he might prove a most unsatisfactory husband—he looked ill-tempered.
Mrs. Blagdon, for her part, had a few words to say to her son before she flitted south.
“Hugo, I hope you and Letty will pull well together,” to which he merely grunted a reply. “You must make allowances for her. I think she is trying hard to please you. She is a simple little thing—and so young—not yet full grown—and her mind only half developed.”
“Half baked, you mean!” he corrected angrily.
“No, no; she has plenty of brains. What she wants, is worldly wisdom; her French is perfect, and her singing and playing astonishing for her age.”
“Just school accomplishments!”
“The others will come; but Letty really won’t be fit to be mistress of this great place, to look the part, and to hold her own, for a couple of years.”
“If ever!”
“Now, suppose you were to close Sharsley for a little, and travel, and let her see the world, and mix in society?”