The next day she went to London.
“We shall see you in the holidays,” Henrietta Lucian said to her affectionately, “and Maurice says he’s going to be in London a good deal now—research-work, he calls it—and he wants to go and see you.”
“Oh, yes. He can come to Ovington Street whenever he likes. I’m going to stay with my uncle there—for a bit—he’s a pawnbroker.”
Rose had come to add that piece of information, which was by no means new to Miss Lucian, almost automatically, in her determination not to risk gratifying Ford Aviolet by suppressing it.
She was very much pleased when she found herself in London again.
“I declare, I like the good old smell of the gas upstairs,” she emphatically announced to Felix Menebees, who carried her box up to her bedroom.
The gaunt youth, panting, and paler than ever from the ascent, smiled at her rapturously.
“Yes, Mrs. Aviolet, I’m sure we’re all delighted that you’ve come back again, if I may be allowed to say so.”
It was very evident, indeed, that Felix spoke truth at least as regarded himself, and Rose, with characteristic catholicity of outlook, welcomed his obvious admiration with exactly the same indiscriminate gratification that she had accorded to Charlesbury’s. But for all her transparent vanity, the daughter of the late Mrs. Smith did not lack shrewdness. She was perfectly aware that she might very well find herself falling in love with Lord Charlesbury, and she knew equally well that, although he had admired her at Squires, it was scarcely probable that he would ask her to marry him.
“And I don’t know that I’d accept him if he did,” Rose told herself stoutly. “It would be biting off a good deal more than I could chew, it seems to me. A place bigger than Squires, and a title, and another boy as well as Cecil, and perhaps babies of my own as well! There’d be more sense in taking Maurice Lucian than that!”