“Her bed has not been slept in!” announced Mrs Ravenscar dramatically. “I went in, just to see how she did, a couple of hours ago, for you must know that I myself am quite unable to sleep in all the racket of town—not that I mean to complain, I am sure, but so it is! And she was not in her room, and not a word can I get out of that wicked maid of hers, who, I am positive, is in the plot! She will do nothing but cry, and say that she knows nothing!”
“You had better get rid of the girl,” said Ravenscar unemotionally.
“It is all very well for you to dismiss the matter so lightly, Max, but if you knew the number of abigails I have engaged to wait on Arabella, and each one of them less fit to be trusted than the last! Besides, how will that help us in our present predicament?”
“It won’t,” he replied. “Nor will anything help us in any future predicaments of the same nature except your forgetting all these megrims of yours, Olivia, and taking Belle to the balls and masquerades her heart craves for. Where has she gone tonight?”
“How should I know? I do not know how you can stand there, speaking to me in that brutal fashion, when you know how the least thing oversets my poor nerves! It is unfeeling of you, and I did not look for such usage at your hands, though to be sure I might well, for your father was just such another! I will tell you what it is, Max: if you had the smallest consideration for me, or for your poor sister—who is your ward, let me remind you!—you would have married years ago, and provided the child with a chaperon who might have escorted her to parties without being prostrated by exhaustion for days after!”
“Of all the reasons I ever heard for embarking on the married state, that one appeals the least to me!” said Ravenscar roundly. “You had better go up to bed, ma’am: I have little doubt that already your nerves will suffer from the effects of this night.”
“I have had the most dreadful palpitations this past hour and more. But where can that dreadful child be?”
“I have no idea, and nothing is farther from my intention than to scour London in search of her. She will return presently.”
“If anyone were to hear of these pranks of hers, it would ruin all her chances of making a good match!” mourned Mrs Ravenscar, drifting towards the stairs.
“Nonsense!” said Ravenscar. “Nothing can ruin the chances of an heiress of making a good match!”