“What do you mean by the thing itself?” Stasy demanded.
“The being pretty, or the trying to be—the aiming at beauty, I suppose, I mean,” said Blanche. “Can’t you imagine a painter giving years to a beautiful picture, even though he knew no one would ever see it but himself? or a musician composing music no one would ever hear?”
“No,” said Stasy, “I can’t. That sort of thing is flights above me, Blanchie. I like human beings about me—lots of them; they generally interest me, and often amuse me. I like a good many, and I am quite ready to love some. I want sympathy and life, and—and—well, perhaps, a little admiration. And I do think it’s too horribly dull here; at least, I’m afraid it’s going to be. I would rather leave off being at all grand, and get some fun out of the Wandles, and the Beltons, and all the rest of them.”
“Mamma is still looking forward to Sir Adam’s return in the spring—well, soon, it should be now. It is spring already,” said Blanche, rather at a loss, as she often was, how to reply to Stasy’s outburst.
“I don’t believe he’ll come to see us; or if he does, I don’t suppose it would do us much good. He has been away so long, and is no use to the neighbourhood; and I believe that’s all that most people care about,” said Stasy cynically. “These families round about here live their own lives and have their own circles. They’ll all be going up to London directly, I suppose, for the season. They don’t want us, or care about quiet, not very rich, people like us. England isn’t a bit like what I thought it would be.”
“We can’t quite judge yet,” said Blanche. “And—I am sure you are too sweeping, Stasy. Mamma may have been too sanguine, and have seen things too much through rose-coloured spectacles, but she cannot be altogether mistaken in her pleasant remembrances of her old friends—the ‘best’ people—among whom she lived.”
“Would you give Lady Harriot Dunstan as a specimen?” said Stasy snappishly.
“No; she would be a common-minded, inferior woman in any class,” said Blanche. “I believe that is the truth of it all: there are refined and charming natures to be found in every class, and there are the opposite.”
“Well, then, let us hunt up a few among the Blissmore bourgeoisie, and content ourselves with them,” said Stasy.
“No,” said Blanche again. “It is one’s duty to live in one’s own class unless one is plainly shown it is necessary to leave it. And that reminds me, speaking of Lady Harriot, I really think mamma should call there, now we are settled. She did not mean to be impertinent, we must remember.”