“Is Aunt Sophia ever too busy to say what she wants to?”
“Dave Carney, for one thing.”
Honor laughed. “Surely, my dear child, you are not staying up half the night just because Aunt Sophia sees fit to criticise Dave Carney? If I minded her as much as that, I should never sleep a wink after she had been talking about poor B. Lafferty, who, by the way, declares that she is going to-morrow ‘for certain sure!’ What does she say about Dave?”
“Oh, she doesn’t think he is honest, because she was sure she saw him going into a pawnbroker’s shop. As if that proved anything! She might just as well say that I wasn’t, because I sold the gold and the—” Victoria paused.
“Not quite the same thing,” said Honor, “for you really had the things to sell; but I can’t imagine where Dave Carney gets anything to pawn. But I can’t think why you are so worried, Vic. Aunt Sophia has been saying that sort of thing all our lives.”
“Oh, I know that. It isn’t that I am worried about, of course, Honor. She was speaking about something else, that I hadn’t thought of before. Something about Katherine.”
“What about her?” asked Honor, quickly.
“Well, she said first that she was selfish and extravagant, and then—I really hate to repeat it, Honor, for it doesn’t seem a bit nice, but I must tell you—then she said it didn’t make so much difference as she was going to marry a rich man, or ‘make a good match,’ as she expressed it. Don’t you think it was rather disagreeable for Aunt Sophia to say that? And whom do you suppose she meant, Honor?”
“Mr. Madison, of course.”