‘Tell me, Ida, there’s a dear.’
‘She says they were all frightfully dissipated’ (Ida said it quite with a relish)—‘the old Lord and Mr. Morton, Lady Adela’s husband, you know, and Miss Bertha—always racing and hunting and gambling and in debt. Then there came a Captain Alder, who was ever so much in love with Miss Bertha, but most awfully in debt to her brother, and very passionate besides. So he took him out in his dog-cart with a fiery horse that was sure to run away.’
‘Who did?’
‘Captain Alder took Mr. Morton, though they begged and prayed him not, and the horse ran away and Mr. Morton was thrown out and killed.’
‘Oh!’ with extreme zest. ‘On purpose?’
‘Miss Bertha was sure it was, so that she might have all the fortune, and so she told him, and flung the betrothal ring in his face, and he went right off, and never has been heard of since.’
‘Well, that is interesting. Do you think he shot himself?’
‘No, he was too mean. Most likely he married a hideous millionaire: but the Mortons were always dreadful, and did all sorts of wicked things.’
‘I declare it’s as good as any tale—like the sweet one in the Young Ladies’ Friend now—“The Pride of Pedro.” Have you seen it?’
‘No, indeed, uncle and aunt only have great old stupid books! They wanted me to read those horrid tiresome things of Scott’s, and Dickens’s too, who is as old as the hills! Why, they could not think of anything better to do on their wedding tour but to go to all the places in the Waverley novels.’