“Which is quite good enough for her,” Mrs Dean had said to herself.
Cora had not taken off her things, but had gone to the window, to stand looking out, and biting her lips with shame and rage, as she heard her mother’s words to the girl.
“Trust me, ma’am?” Annie said, with her mouth half full of sweet Madeira cake, “that you may, ma’am, as much as you would aunty. Oh, yes, I’m sure aunty gave his lordship the notes, and he only laughed.”
Cora’s beautiful white teeth gritted together as, ill-bred as she was, she knew well enough that had she wished Lord Carboro’s openly-manifested admiration to ripen to her profit, her mother’s open invitations to him to call would have destroyed her chance.
Then she tried to shut her ears to what was going on, and stood there wondering whether Richard Linnell would go out while she stood there—why it was the house had been so quiet that morning, for she generally listened for an hour to him playing duets with his father.
Then she wondered rather bitterly whether he would ever care for her, and his coldly polite way be changed. He was always civil and pleasant, and chatted with her when they met, but that was all, and at times it mortified her, as she thought how beautiful she was, making her vow that she would be revenged upon him, while at other times all this made her sit down and sob by the hour together.
“Why should I trouble about him?” she was asking herself just then, as she gazed from the window, and ignored the low buzzing of Annie’s voice, which came huskily through Madeira cake, “I, who might accept almost any man I like. I’ve good looks, and money, and there are hundreds of men who would be only too glad of a smile. As for—”
“Mr Linnell, ma’am? Oh, yes, it’s quite true,” Annie was whispering, and the name sent a thrill through Cora.
“But he lives downstairs, girl, and we should have known.”
“Oh, yes, ma’am, I learn by heart—aunty makes me—where all the fashionable people live. I know Mr Linnell—two Mr Linnells—live downstairs. It’s in our visitor’s list, along with you, and Colonel Mellersh, and it’s quite true.”