“I see how it is,” said Lady Barbara; “you have heard one side. I do not contradict. I know the girl would not wilfully deceive by word; and I am willing to confess that I am not capable of dealing with her. Only from a sense of duty did I ever undertake it.”
“Of duty, Barbara?” he asked.
“Yes—of duty to the family.”
“We do not see those things in the same light,” he said quietly. “I thought, as you know, that the duty was more incumbent when the child was left an orphan—a burthen on relatives who could ill afford to be charged with her. Perhaps, Barbara, if you had noticed her then, instead of waiting till circumstances made her the head of our family, you might have been able to give her that which has been wanting in your otherwise conscientious training—affection.”
Lady Barbara held up her head, stiffly, but she was very near tears, of pain and wounded pride; but she would not defend herself; and she saw that even her faithful Jane did not feel with her.
“I came home, Barbara,” continued the Colonel, “resolving that—much as I wished for Emily’s sake that this little girl should need a home with us—if you had found in her a new interest and delight, and were in her—let me say it, Barbara—healing old sores, and giving her your own good sense and high principle, I would not say one word to disturb so happy a state of things. I come and find the child a state prisoner, whom you are endeavouring by all means to alienate from the friends to whom she owes a daughter’s gratitude; I find her not complaining of you, but answering me with the saddest account a child can give of herself—she is always naughty. After this, Barbara, I can be doing you no injury in asking you to concur with me in arrangements for putting the child under my wife’s care as soon as possible.”
“To-morrow, if you like,” said Lady Barbara. “I took her only from a sense of duty; and it has half killed Jane. I would not keep her upon any consideration!”
“O Barbara, it has not hurt me.—O Giles, she will always be so anxious about me; it is all my fault for being nervous and foolish!” cried Lady Jane, with quivering voice, and tears in her eyes. “If it had not been for that, we could have made her so happy, dear little spirited thing. But dear Barbara spoils me, and I know I give way too much.”
“This will keep you awake all night!” said Barbara, as the Colonel’s tender gesture agitated Jane more. “Indeed, Giles, you should have chosen a better moment for this conversation—on almost your first arrival too! But the very existence of this child is a misfortune!”
“Let us trust that in a few years she may give you reason to think otherwise,” said the Colonel. “Did you mean what you said—that you wished us to take her to-morrow?”