“Do not interrupt me, Isabel. Miss Douglas, please wait until I finish before you make any remarks,” Mrs. Coolidge said, coldly, with a wave of her hand; then continued: “As I was saying, I think you either stole them, or you have had relations with some person which would debar you from ever entering any respectable family, though I cannot conceive how anyone could be such a fool as to lavish so much upon a——”
“Cease!” came in a hoarse whisper from Brownie’s lovely lips, which had grown of the color of ashes, and were quivering with insulted pride and anger, while her heart stood still with horror.
The word checked Mrs. Coolidge, in spite of her insolent self-assurance, and, bad as her language had been, she was ever after glad that she had not uttered that last maddening word.
To be accused of theft had been almost more than Brownie could bear.
A Douglas accused of stealing!
But the other insinuation! She had hardly been able to comprehend it at first.
She grew sick at heart, dizzy and faint, when the woman’s meaning at length burst upon and nearly crashed her.
For one moment her blood seemed turned to ice, and her brain on fire.
The next, conscious virtue asserted itself.
The proud figure grew more proudly erect, the little head was lifted with a haughty grace, and Queen Margaret Tudor herself, of whom Miss Mehetabel had been wont to boast, would have gloried in the majesty of her appearance.