"My father being so good himself," said Bella ironically, and feeling quite cool. "Mr. Lister is not a profligate, Aunt Rosamund, and you are a bad woman!"
Mrs. Coppersley gasped like a dying dolphin. "Me a bad woman!" she cried, puffing out her cheeks ludicrously; "me, when Henry says that I am the best woman in the world. And I'd have you know, Bella, that I'm a lady and no woman, miss—so there."
The girl, in spite of her grief and dismay, laughed right out. "Even a lady must be a woman," she observed sarcastically.
"Leave my house! leave my house," panted Mrs. Coppersley.
"No. I shall remain here until I know if the will is correct. I shall stay here, as I say, and shall receive polite treatment. If I do not, I shall dispute the will, and make things unpleasant."
Mrs. Coppersley snapped her fingers. "That for all the harm you can do," she said coarsely. "The will stands good in law. I have made sure of that by consulting Mr. Timson, who drew it up. You can stay here for a week; at the end of that time you pack up and go."
"Where to, Aunt Rosamund?"
"That's your look out, miss. But you don't stay here to spoil my honeymoon with my darling Henry."
Bella shrugged her shoulders. It really was not worth while losing her temper with a person whose methods were so crude. The more enraged Mrs. Coppersley became, the cooler Bella felt. "Do you know what you are, Aunt Rosamund?" she remarked coolly. "You are a bully, and a petty tyrant. While my father was alive you cringed to him because you were afraid. Now that you think you have the whip hand of me, you vent your spite on one whom you think cannot retaliate. If I had the money, you would cringe to me; as you have it, you take every advantage of your position. But it won't do, Aunt Rosamund, for I am not the girl to submit to your insults. I shall stop here so long as it pleases me to stop, and if you make yourself disagreeable I shall know what to do."
Mrs. Coppersley's face grew slowly white, and her mouth opened and shut like a cod-fish. Had Bella wept, she would have gone on bullying triumphantly, but this cool, calm, scornful demeanour frightened her. At heart, like all bullies, she was a coward, and knew well that if it were known how she had ousted Bella from her rightful inheritance, that she would be unpopular. As Mrs. Coppersley liked to be popular, and hoped, by means of her marriage with Vand, her wrongfully obtained income, and her possession of Bleacres, to be the great lady of the neighbourhood, she did not wish to drive Bella to extremes. She therefore wiped her face, and hedged.