"The woman must be mad!" exclaimed Grace. "Anxiety of mind! I never heard anything so ridiculous."
The other letter was from a Mrs. Geoffrey Lansdowne Bill, who used her name in extenso through it, from end to end.
"Mrs. Geoffrey Lansdowne Bill, having rather a more roomy house than she requires, would resign two rooms to the young lady who advertised for a happy and refined home and chaperonage. Mrs. Geoffrey Lansdowne Bill, having married two of her daughters well, would be quite prepared to farther the young lady's views in that direction.
"The society among which she moves is mixed, partaking of the literary and fashionable equally. Mrs. Geoffrey Lansdowne Bill of course expects to be very handsomely remunerated for her trouble, and I wish to hear from the young lady at once."
Even Margaret laughed heartily over this effusion.
"A pity one of her literary friends did not help her to write her letter," she said, laughing, as she looked it over, "and keep her tenses in order."
"I should think the society was 'mixed,'" exclaimed Grace, wrathfully, "and I know what you are thinking—you think that these two failures will prove me to be quite wrong—you imagine that this will convince me that my plan is an impossible one—but I mean to do it somehow."
"Very well," said Margaret, very quietly.
Only two days after this Grace came into the room, with a rush, and announced that Mr. Stevens was there and wished to see her; and, in the same breath, she added, "I have seen Lady Lyons, and she is going to look after me, she has gone to London to see about rooms, and now nothing remains but for you to say how much money you can give me. I shall want plenty, you know, and do not keep me a moment in suspense." Before Margaret could answer her she was gone.
There was always a bitter sense of humiliation to poor Margaret when the question of her husband's money had to be touched upon.