"You will be a very princess, if you take him, Adela," said Lady Acorn. "Ah! I can tell you, child, before you have come to my age you will have found out that there's little worth living for but wealth, which brings ease and comfort. I ought to know; for our want of it, through one absurd extravagance or another"—with a dreadful glance at her lord—"has been the worry and bane of my married life."
"You have been extravagant on your own score," growled he.
"But, papa, I don't care for Mr. Grubb. Apart from the disreputable fact that he is a tradesman——"
"Those merchant-princes cannot be called tradesmen, Adela," quickly interposed Lord Acorn, who could put the case strongly, in spite of his prejudices, when it suited his interest to do so.
"Well, apart from that, I say I do not like him."
"You cannot dislike him. No one can dislike Francis Grubb."
"I shall if I am made to marry him."
Her obstinate mood was returning; they saw that, and they let her escape for a time. Adela, the youngest and most beautiful of all their children, had been reprehensibly indulged: allowed to grow up in the belief that the world was made for her.
"Well, Adela, and how have you sped?" asked Grace.
"Oh, I don't know," was Adela's answer, as she flung herself into a low chair by her dressing-table. "Mamma is so fond of telling us that the world's full of trouble; and I think it is."