“That is true, and had she no daughter of her own, I should never mention the fact. I would attend to her as I would my real mother, and be glad to do so; but she has three daughters of her own; two grown-up and the other quite old enough to be useful.”
“That is true.”
“They should have taken care of her.”
“They do not know how to, Miss Aldworth. I cannot express to you the neglect that poor woman suffered. She is not very strong-minded herself, and she never knew how to command, how to order, how to force those girls to do their duty. They need some one with a head on her shoulders to guide them. The poor thing drifted and let them drift, and the state of things was disgraceful. It could not have gone on. Had you failed to come, you would soon have had no stepmother to trouble you.”
“I am glad I came,” said Marcia, and the tears started to her eyes.
“I knew you would be.”
“And yet,” continued the girl, “it means a great deal of self-sacrifice on my part.”
“I thought you were a teacher in a school.”
“In one sense you are right, in another wrong. I am a teacher, or I was a teacher, in Mrs Silchester’s school at Frankfort. Mrs Silchester is Miss St. Just’s aunt, and Angela St. Just has been my dearest friend for some years.”
“Indeed?”