“The interest! I had forgotten that! Oh, ought we to pay that too?” said Miss Grantham, appalled.
Lady Bellingham flung up her hands. “Deb, you are mad! I do not know what has come over you! It was bad enough when you wantonly threw away twenty thousand pounds—and I can scarcely bear to think of that, when I remember all the shocking bills!—but when it comes to refusing to accept the dreadful mortgage, which you have spent a week trying to get from Ravenscar, it goes beyond all bounds! Anyone would have supposed that you would be thankful to get the wretched thing so easily! But not at all! I do believe you would have preferred to have wrested it from Ravenscar by main force.
“Yes, I would,” replied Miss Grantham earnestly. “Much rather! That would have been my wits against his! This—oh, I wonder you cannot see how impossible it is!”
“I cannot, and I never shall,” said her aunt. “At least, I hope I shall not, but sometimes I feel as though I were going mad too. I wish you will let me call in the doctor to you! I am sure you have caught a touch of the sun, or contracted some horrid disease which is sending you out of your mind!”
Before Miss Grantham could repudiate this suggestion there was a hurried tap on the door, followed immediately by the entrance of Miss Laxton into the room, looking as white as her tucker.
“Good God, child, what is the matter with you?” exclaimed Lady Bellingham.
Miss Laxton took a wavering step towards Deborah. “Sir James!” she managed to utter, and crumpled up where she stood, in a dead faint.
“Oh, heavens, if it is not one thing it is another!” wailed her ladyship, looking round wildly for the vinaigrette. “Untie her laces! Where are those salts? Why is nothing ever where it is wanted? Ring the bell! Oh no, the hartshorn is in that cupboard! I shall go distracted! You ought to burn some feathers under her nose, but there are only the new ostrich plumes in my best hat, and really—However, take them if you like! I am sure I do not grudge them!”
Deborah, who had dropped on to her knees beside Miss Laxton’s inanimate form, raised her head to say: “My dear ma’am, it is quite unnecessary! Have the goodness to bring me a little water, and I will engage for it that she will soon come round! Poor child, what can have happened, I wonder? Did she say Sir James was here?”
“She said Sir James, but I heard nothing more. If this is his doing, I will step downstairs immediately, and give him a piece of my mind. This may be a gaming-house, but if he thinks to come to it simply to terrify stupid girls he is very much mistaken, and so he will find before he is a day older!”