"There is a mass of splendid material, Sir Oswald," she said; "but the difficulty lies in putting it into shape."
"I am afraid," he observed, "people will make remarks; and I have heard more than one doubt expressed as to what kind of hands Darrell Court is likely to fall into should I make Pauline my heiress. You see she is capable of almost anything. She would turn the place into an asylum; she would transform it into a college for philosophers, a home for needy artists—in fact, anything that might occur to her—without the least hesitation."
Miss Hastings could not deny it. They were not speaking of a manageable nineteenth century young lady, but of one to whom no ordinary rules applied, whom no customary measures fitted.
"I have a letter here," continued Sir Oswald, "from Captain Aubrey Langton, the son of one of my oldest and dearest friends. He proposes to pay me a visit, and—pray, Miss Hastings, pardon me for suggesting such a thing, but I should be so glad if he would fall in love with Pauline. I have an idea that love might educate and develop her more quickly than anything else."
Miss Hastings had already thought the same thing; but she knew whoever won the love of such a girl as Pauline Darrell would be one of the cleverest of men.
"I am writing to him to tell him that I hope he will remain with us for a month; and during that time I hope, I fervently hope, he may fall in love with my niece. She is beautiful enough. Pardon me again, Miss Hastings, but has she ever spoken to you of love or lovers?"
"No. She is in that respect, as in many others, quite unlike the generality of girls. I have never heard an allusion to such matters from her lips—never once."
This fact seemed to Sir Oswald stranger than any other; he had an idea that girls devoted the greater part of their thoughts to such subjects.
"Do you think," he inquired, "that she cared for any one in Paris—any of those men, for instance, whom she used to meet at her father's?"
"No," replied Miss Hastings; "I do not think so. She is strangely backward in all such respects, although she was brought up entirely among gentlemen."