“Then perhaps you will go to stay with them—your mother, and your—your mother’s husband, and you too; and we’ll all meet. They live at a place-called The Meadows. It isn’t as old or as beautiful as our Manor, but it’s a sweet place, and the girls are so nice you’ll be sure to like them.”
“Yes, I dare say I shall,” said Maggie, who didn’t care to contradict Merry’s innocent ideas with regard to her mother’s marriage.
“Well, I am glad,” said Merry, “that your dear mother has married a rich gentleman. Has he a country place of his own?”
“Of course he has,” said Maggie, who felt that she could at least utter these words with truth.
“And is it far, far from London, or quite in the country?”
“It is,” said Maggie, “in—in the Norwood direction.”
This remark made no impression whatever on Merry, who had not the least idea where the Norwood direction was. But by-and-by, when she parted from Maggie and joined her sister and Aneta, she said, “I have a piece of rather good news to tell about dear Maggie Howland. She won’t be poor any more.” 113
“That is a word we never discuss at school,” said Aneta.
“Well, we needn’t after to-night,” said Merry with a slight touch of irritation in her manner. “But although I haven’t the faintest idea what poverty means, I think poor Maggie knows a good deal about it. Well, she won’t have anything to do with it in future, for her mother has just married again.”
“Oh!” said Aneta, with a show of interest.