'I will leave you to rest a little, and when you are ready for a walk in the park, please ring the bell and Naomi will fetch me,' said Sarah as she went off, relieved to find that Horatia took everything in a friendly spirit.
'Oh Miss Horatia, this is a funny house!' exclaimed Horatia's nurse.
'I don't see anything funny in it,' said Horatia; 'it's a very beautiful one.'
'Yes, miss, it is that; these people must have a mint of money. Why, look at these rooms; they're fit for a king. And to think that poor thing is the mistress of it all. She doesn't look hardly fit,' said the woman.
Horatia let this remark pass in silence; but if her loyalty to her hostess had let her she would probably have agreed with her nurse, for she did feel, somehow, as Sarah did, that it was all too grand, and oppressed her somehow. 'My dresses are not grand enough for these rooms, Nanny, or for this house,' she replied.
But this was too much for the old nurse. 'You'll look a lady and be a lady in the commonest of them, and that's more than these Clays be, for all their money,' she cried indignantly.
'That isn't very nice of you when they are so kind to us, Nanny, and have asked us here so that we may enjoy ourselves,' said Horatia reproachfully.
'No, Miss Horatia, it isn't, and I ought to be ashamed of myself that you have to teach me my duty instead of me showing you a good example; but I felt wild to think of them, perhaps, thinking themselves better than you because they have such a lot of money out of blankets,' said the good woman. 'Why, I'd sooner have The Grange than this house any day.'
'So would I, of course, because it's my home; but I wouldn't mind having a bathroom like this, all marble and silver, and all those lovely little contrivances to wash yourself without any trouble; and I will some day, when I'm rich,' declared Horatia.