Miss Mell shook her head.
“Then you can have Rosaleen!” cried Miss Waters, with triumph. “I’m so glad, for your sake, and for her sake. It’s an ideal arrangement!”
And, seeing that Miss Mell looked only polite and not enthusiastic, she went on:
“You will just love that child! She has the disposition of an angel. Never a cross or disagreeable word. And after all she’s been through!”
“Yes,” said Miss Mell. “She seems very nice. We’ll be glad to have her.”
“You see,” Miss Waters went on, in a whisper. “Yesterday, not an hour after you’d left the house, a letter came for her from that beastly woman I told you about—that Amy Humbert. And in it, my dear, was a cheque for five hundred dollars. It seems that the nice sister had told her on her deathbed to give that to Rosaleen when she was twenty-one. She wrote—this Amy woman, I mean—that she wasn’t legally obliged to give it to Rosaleen, but that she felt it was a moral obligation, and that she always tried to do what was right, and more like that. You know the sort of person, Dodo! Well!... The poor child was wild with joy.... And I advised her to come with you, if it could be done. Five hundred dollars will keep her for a long time, if she’s careful, and she ought to be earning a good living long before it’s gone. Don’t you think so?”
“Yes, I should think so,” said Miss Mell, thoughtfully.
“Then I’ll tell her!” said Miss Waters, and hastened into the big room, where Rosaleen stood, looking sheepishly about her. Miss Bainbridge had discouraged her attempts at conversation with no great gentleness and the chairs were all filled with things, so that she couldn’t even sit down.
“It’s all right!” cried Miss Waters. “I am so glad!”
“Look round and see how you like it,” said Miss Mell, and they did.