“Kitty goes free.”
“She has her creditor’s release?”
“For every shilling.”
“And if he only fails?”
“Why then of course,” said now quite lucid Lady Grace, “she throws herself more than ever on poor father.”
“Poor father indeed!”—Lady Sandgate richly sighed it
It appeared even to create in the younger woman a sense of excess. “Yes—but he after all and in spite of everything adores her.”
“To the point, you mean”—for Lady Sandgate could clearly but wonder—“of really sacrificing you?”
The weight of Lady Grace’s charming deep eyes on her face made her pause while, at some length, she gave back this look and the interchange determined in the girl a grave appeal. “You think I should be sacrificed if I married him?”
Lady Sandgate replied, though with an equal emphasis, indirectly. “Could you marry him?”