“You see, my dear Rhoda,” she said, in a would-be affectionate tone, “I am bound to do all I can for my only sister’s only child. I would not do you so much injury as to suppose you insensible to the kindness I have shown you. Indeed, if you had been something younger, and had wished to learn any trade, I would willingly have paid the premium with you. And ’tis no slight matter, I can assure you. Eighty pounds would have been the least for which I could have put you with a milliner or mantua-maker, to learn her trade. But, however, ’tis no good talking of that, for you are a good nine years too old. So there is nothing before you but service, without you marry, or to take my Lady Betty’s house. Now, my dear, you may go and divert yourself; we will not talk of this matter again till the young gentlewomen have ended their visit.”
And with a nod of dismissal, Mrs Latrobe rose and passed out of the room, evidently considering her duties exceeded by her merits, and leaving Rhoda too stunned for words.
Trade, indeed! If there could be a deeper depth than the Maidens’ Lodge, it was trade, in Rhoda’s eyes. Domestic service was incomparably more respectable and honourable. As to matrimony, which her aunt had, as it were, flung into the scales as she passed, Rhoda’s heart was still too sore to think of it.
An hour later brought Betty and Molly.
“How do you, Rhoda, dear?” inquired the former, kindly.
“Well!—got over it, Red Currants?” interrogated Molly.
“Over what, I beg?” said Rhoda, rather haughtily.
Molly sang her answer:—
“‘I lost my looks, I lost my health,
I lost my wit—my love kept true;
But one fine day I lost my wealth,
And, presto! off my lover flew.’
“Isn’t that about it, old Tadpole?”