The old lady laid her hand impressively upon the girl’s arm.
“No, my dear, you are to stay,” she said earnestly. “I was delighted to see you yesterday, and again to-day, and to believe more and more that we have found in you just the link which has been wanting. You have a mission in that household, Miss Pembury, a delicate one perhaps, but one that I am sure you will perform in the most efficient manner.”
“Oh, no, no,” cried Rhoda. “I am not so ambitious. And indeed I would much rather retire into the background altogether.”
Lady Eridge interrupted her.
“You will not hesitate, I am sure,” she said, “to give up your own wishes when you realise what a useful office you could perform if you could succeed in drawing these two nearer together.”
“I don’t think you quite realise, Lady Eridge,” replied Rhoda earnestly, “the difficulty of interfering in any way between husband and wife.”
“I shouldn’t call it interference.”
“But that’s what it must come to,” persisted Rhoda. “And the task requires a great deal more tact and cleverness than I possess. Lady Sarah is cleverer than I am, and she is more likely to do what she pleases with me, than I am to make her do anything she doesn’t care to do of her own free will.”
But obstinacy was a trait which Lady Sarah had inherited from her mother, and the Marchioness went on:
“I don’t want you to preach to her, or anything of that kind. It is by example that I want you to lead her back to her duty.”