Then Mary's pride came back to her and the natural impulse to confide in the woman was crushed down.
"I suppose I made a mistake," she said. "After all, it is not an uncommon thing to find chance likenesses to your friends in other people. You must find London a great change after being brought up in the country."
The woman sighed deeply and a look of pain came into her eyes. It was evident that she had felt the change far more cruelly than Mary had imagined. The girl longed to ask further questions, but she restrained her curiosity. Nor could Connie Colam throw any light on the subject after she returned. She knew very little about Mrs. Speed, except that she was a widow with a grown-up son, who had been a great trouble to her. The son appeared occasionally, and Mrs. Speed always seemed to be in deep distress afterwards. Mary was still debating the matter in her mind at bedtime. After breakfast the following morning there were more important matters to occupy her attention.
"Now you are going to show me what you can do," Connie said cheerfully. "I take it that you have come up here with a view to getting your own living. If you have any money----"
"You may get that idea out of your mind altogether," Mary smiled. "I have a very few pounds to keep me going for the present, and a little jewellery to fall back upon. I have not been used to this kind of life, and I shall probably find it trying at first. But I am going to succeed. We have lost our position socially and financially, and I would not be beholden to those who have taken our place. I need not say more than that."
"That is just as you please," Connie said somewhat coldly. "I see you are terribly proud and reserved, but you will grow out of that. And I like your face. But please don't make up your mind that it is a very easy thing for a girl to get her living in London. When you come to know the inside of a pawnshop, and share the last sixpence with a friend, you will be all the sweeter and better for it. Now show me your work."
Not without some pardonable pride, Mary displayed her drawings. There were pretty landscapes in water colours, studies of groups of flowers in oils, and the like, all the conventional kind of stuff that girls produce at finishing schools under the eye of some discreet and clever master. But they did not seem to impress Connie, who handled them with some contempt. Mary's sensitive face flushed.
"You do not seem to care for them," she said with a challenge in her voice.
"Oh, it isn't that," Connie replied. "It's the uselessness of the things. I daresay that a good many of your friends have seriously advised you take up art as a career."
"Two or three people," Mary protested, "who are in a position to judge."