“There’s nothing to tell,” she said. “Three Star was just a diggers’ camp, and Varley—I mean, Mr. Howard”—for she remembered that Mr. Pinchook had told her to speak of Varley as “Mr. Howard”—“took care of me. He was very good to me; as good to me as any father could be.” Her long lashes quivered. “And so were all the boys—I mean, the men in the camp. We call them boys. Some of them are quite old, you know.”
“I see,” said Lady Wyndover. “And had you no lady friend?”
“There was Mother Melinda there,” said Esmeralda, “and black-eyed Polly, and one or two others.”
Lady Wyndover again tried not to shudder.
“How strange it must seem to you!” she said.
“What?” asked Esmeralda.
“This sudden change in your circumstances, my dear; from a diggers’ camp to London; from poverty—I beg your pardon, dear. I suppose you were poor?”
“I suppose so,” said Esmeralda, naïvely. “Sometimes there was plenty of money, and sometimes there wasn’t; it just depended upon Varley’s luck.”
“Oh!” said Lady Wyndover, who, not having been informed of Mr. Howard’s profession, did not understand in the least.
“Yes,” said Esmeralda, “when he was in luck we had plenty of things—fruit and wine from Melbourne, and new clothes; when he wasn’t in luck—well, we didn’t.”