“No, my dear; nor do I at all see why people should always leap to the conclusion that an old maid must be an ill-tempered, lonely, disappointed creature. Sure, there are other relatives in this world beside husbands and children; and if she choose her own lot, what cause hath she for disappointment? ’Tis but a few day since Mr Leighton said, in my hearing, ‘Of course we know, when a gentlewoman is unwed, ’tis her misfortune rather than her fault’—and I do believe the poor man thought he paid us women a compliment in so speaking. For me, I felt it an insult.”
“Why so, Mrs Dolly?”
“Why, think what it meant, my dear. ‘Of course, a woman cannot be so insensible to the virtues and attractions of men that she should wish to remain unwed; therefore, if this calamity overtake her, it shows that she hath no virtues nor attractions herself.’”
“You don’t think Mr Leighton meant that, Mrs Dolly?” asked Rhoda, laughing.
“No, my dear; I think he did not see the meaning of his own words. But tell me, if it is not a piece of great vanity on the part of men, that while they never think to condole with a man who is unmarried, but take it undoubted that he prefers that life, they take it as equally undoubted that a woman doth not prefer it, and lament over her being left at ease and liberty as though she had suffered some great misfortune?”
“I never did see such queer notions as you have, Mrs Dolly! I can’t think where you get them,” said Rhoda. “However, you may say what you will; I mean to marry, and I am going to be rich too. And I expect I shall like both of them.”
“My dear!” and Mrs Dorothy laid down her work, and looked earnestly at Rhoda. “How do you know you are going to be rich?”
“Why, I shall have White-Ladies,” answered Rhoda. “And of course Aunt Harriet will leave me everything.”
“Have Madam and Mrs Harriet told you so, my dear?”
“No,” said Rhoda, rather impatiently. “But who else should they leave it to?”