Lady Wyndover didn’t ask who and what “The Penman” was; she was almost exhausted by the series of shocks she had endured already.
“I saw that there was a habit among your things, and you said you rode from somewhere, with your luggage on your back, or was it on the saddle? You can ride, at any rate!”
“Yes, I can ride and shoot and swim—and that’s about all,” said Esmeralda. “Can you play the piano? I should like to hear you, if you’re not tired,” she added, glancing at her ladyship’s half-closed eyes and indolent attitude.
Lady Wyndover went to the piano, and played softly, and Esmeralda listened with her great eyes fixed dreamily on the player. Lady Wyndover, happening to look at her, was struck by their beauty, and the grace of the lithe form, which seemed to be listening, too, in its every limb, and she stopped suddenly, and went over to the chair beside her, and, taking Esmeralda’s hand, said, in almost awe-struck tones:
“My dear, do you know that you have a very great future before you?”
Esmeralda was still listening to the music, though it had ceased, and she started slightly as she looked round.
“Yes,” said Lady Wyndover, “you have the world before you. It will be at your feet—all society at your feet—before many weeks, days, have passed.”
“I don’t know what you mean,” said Esmeralda, with her brows drawn together.
Lady Wyndover patted her hand, and hesitated a moment, then she laughed softly.
“I might as well tell you now as leave you to find it out for yourself,” she said. “You must learn it, sooner or later—sooner!—and it isn’t fair to let you go into the midst of the battle unarmed. My dear child, you are not only one of the richest women in England, perhaps in the world, but—but”—she bit her lip softly; it was harder than she thought, this enlightening of the uncultivated girl—“but—well, you are not bad-looking; in fact, you are—” She paused, silenced by the grave, innocent eyes. “Well, you will have all the men making themselves idiots about you, and wanting to marry you.”