“By the way,” said Mr. M’Kinlay, searching amongst the papers before him, “there is something here—I just glanced at it—from that young lady. Ay, here it is! You know, Sir Gervais, that you instructed me to write to the land agents of the late Mr. Luttrell, and inform them of your intention to confirm the deed of gift of the lodge in Donegal on Miss Luttrell; in consequence of which I wrote to Messrs. Cane and Carter, and here is their reply. But perhaps I had better keep these business matters for another opportunity?”
“Not at all. We are all friends here, and all about equally interested in these affairs,” said Sir Gervais. “Go on.”
Mr. M’Kinlay mumbled over, in an indistinct tone, something that sounded like an apology for not having more promptly answered his late communication. “‘It was only yesterday,’” he read aloud, “‘that we were in receipt of Miss Luttrell’s reply. The young lady refuses to accept of the property in question. She declines to admit that it had been at any time in the possession of her family, and desires me, while expressing her deep sense of gratitude, to explain that, associated as the spot is to her with a great calamity, it never could be an object of her desire or ambition.’”
“She refers to that scrimmage where her old grandfather killed a man,” said Grenfell, stirring his tea. “Really I fancied they took these things much easier in Ireland.”
“Don’t you see that the young lady is of the exalted school? Not to say that, as she always gambled for a high stake, she can’t abide low play.”
This bitter speech Georgina addressed directly to Grenfell, as the one person in the company adapted to comprehend it. He nodded and smiled a perfect acquiescence with her, and Mr. M’Kinlay read on:
“‘For your own guidance, therefore, as well as Sir Gervais Vyner’s—if you should desire to make the communication to him—I may remark, that any further insistance on this project would be perfectly ineffectual. Everything I have seen of Miss Luttrell has shown her to be a person of most inflexible will, and a determination far beyond the common. This will be apparent to you when you hear that she is equally resolved to make over the Arran estate, bequeathed to her by her late uncle, to the present Mr. Luttrell, leaving herself, as I may say, totally penniless and unprovided for.’”
“What a noble-hearted, generous girl!” cried Vyner.
“The dear, high-hearted Kate!” murmured Ada.
“A most artful, designing minx!” whispered Georgina to Grenfell; “but I suspect that her scheme will not have the success she anticipates.”