"What do you mean?" asked my mother.
"Well, of course, mother dear, we will have our boarding-house. I have thought of the exact sort of house we want. It must be very large and very roomy, and the landlord must be willing to make certain improvements which I will suggest to him. Our boarding-house will be a sort of Utopia in its way, and people who come there will want to come again. We will charge good prices, but we will make our guests very comfortable."
"Oh, my dear, dear child," she said. "How little you know about what you are talking. We shall have an empty house; no one will come to us. Neither you nor I have the faintest idea how to manage. We shall not only lose all the money we have, but we shall be up to our ears in debt. I do wish, Westenra, you would consider that simple little cottage in the country."
"If it must come to our living within our means," I said slowly, "I have not the least doubt that the Duchess of Wilmot would allow me to live with her as a sort of companion and amanuensis, and influence would be brought to bear to get you rooms in Hampton Court; but would you consent, mother darling, would you really consent that I should eat the bread of dependence, and that you should live partly on charity?"
Mother coloured. She had a very delicate colour, and it always made her look remarkably pretty. In her heart of hearts, I really do think she was taken with the idea of Hampton Court. The ladies who lived in those suites of apartments were more or less aristocratic, they were at least all well connected, and she and they might have much in common. It was, in her opinion, rather a distinction than otherwise to live there, but I would have none of it.
"How old are you, mother?" I asked.
"Forty-three," I repeated. "Why, you are quite young, just in the prime of middle-age. What do you mean by sitting with your hands before you for the rest of your life? You are forty-three, and I am twenty-one. Do you think for a single moment that able-bodied women, like ourselves, are to do nothing in the future; for if I did go to the Duchess my post would be merely a sinecure, and you at Hampton Court would vegetate, nothing more. Mother, you will come with me, and help me? We will disregard society; if society is ashamed of us, let it be ashamed, but we must find out, and I have a scheme to propose."
"You are so full of schemes, Westenra, you quite carry me away."