“Not with patience, mamma? I think so.”
“I don’t, Maddy. It seems to take more patience than I’ve got. It’s worse than trying to teach that parrot. It never would learn the words you wanted it to.”
“Is it worth the trouble, mamma, dear?”
“No, my dear, I don’t think it is; but I seemed to fancy that I should like to have a piping bullfinch. Every body has some fancy, dear; and I’m sure mine’s better than Margaret Vine’s for aristocratic connections. Ah! how cross that woman does make me feel.”
“She is rather irritating,” said Madelaine, holding the tip of a white finger between the bars of the cage.
“Irritating?” said the plump little woman flushing; “I call her maddening. The life she leads that poor patient man! dictating as she does, and worrying him about the French estates and the family name, while George Vine is so patient that—”
“He would succeed in teaching a bullfinch to pipe, mamma.”
“Ah, now you’re laughing at me, and thinking me weak; but it’s better to have my weakness than hers. Only fancy: ever since she formed that mad, foolish attachment for that French scoundrel, who coaxed the whole of her money away from her and then threw her over, has George Vine taken her to his home and let her tyrannise over him. A silly woman! Your father always said the man was a scamp. And, by the way, that Mr Pradelle, I don’t like him, my dear.”
“Neither do I, mamma.”
“That’s right, my dear; I’m very glad to hear you say so; but surely Louie Vine is not going to be beguiled by him?”