"I suppose it will really be best," she said. "It would be very awkward for us, as well as for you, if we took up your cause, and, as it were, identified ourselves with it, and then—"
"And then I relapsed back into my original insignificance," said Marion. "Yes, I perceive. And, believe me, I have no desire to sail for a time under false colors, or receive any attention which would be paid only to Mr. Singleton's heiress. Moreover, if the business ends as you evidently expect, I should have no power to return the obligation under which you would have placed me. We will, therefore, say no more about our plans, and I will quietly remain here."
"But you can not remain alone, and I must get back home—"
"Do not let me detain you a day," said Marion, haughtily. "I am not rich in friends, but I can find some one to stay with me, so long as I need a companion; and it is only a question of money."
"Oh! yes, mere companions can be found in sufficient number—people who will be delighted to come. But you ought to have some social protection, some proper chaperon—"
"If all were settled as we thought, that would be necessary," Marion interposed; "but since I may, very likely, soon be deprived of the consequence that Mr. Singleton's money gives me, and since social protection and proper chaperonage are altogether superfluous for a girl without fortune, I need not trouble myself about them in this short interval of waiting."
Mrs. Singleton said no more, but she confided to her husband her opinion that Marion had given up all hope of being able to retain the fortune. "And it has made her dreadfully bitter," she added. "You know she always had a very cynical way of talking for such a young girl, but now that is more pronounced than ever. Disappointment is going very hard with her. I am almost sorry for her, although, of course, she has no right to the money at all."
"She has the right that its owner chose to give it to her," said philosophical Mr. Singleton.
But, although Marion put a bold front on the matter to Mrs. Singleton, her heart really sank at the desolateness of her position. So long as the fortune was still hers, she could buy a companion, as she could buy anything else; but she saw in the eyes of everyone around her the settled conviction that the fortune would be no longer hers. And then?
Meantime, however, it was necessary to make some arrangement, since Mrs. Singleton was eager to be gone; and, turning over in her mind the list of her few acquaintances in Scarborough—for friends she had none,—Marion was asking herself rather blankly to which one she could appeal for advice and assistance in her dilemma, when a servant entered with the announcement that a lady desired to see her.