‘Oh, yes! I know, I know,’ said Mrs. Spencer; ‘he is to be the barrack-master. He rose from the ranks, I think, or something—very poor, and a large family. I know quite what sort of person she would be. The kind of woman that has been pretty, and has quite broken down with children and trouble—I know. It was very good of you; quite like yourself.’
‘If it was very good of me, I have met with a speedy reward,’ said I, ‘for I have quite fallen in love with her—and her daughter. They are coming to me on Saturday—if Mrs. Bellinger is able—for afternoon tea.’
‘I know exactly the kind of person,’ said Mrs. Spencer, nodding her head. ‘Ah, my dear Mrs. Mulgrave, you are always so good, and so——’
‘Easily taken in,’ she was going to say, but I suppose I looked very grave, for she stopped.
‘Is the daughter pretty, too?’ said Lady Isabella: a flush had come upon her face, and she looked at me intently, waiting, I could see, for a sign. She understood that this had something to do with the commission she had given me. And I was so foolish as to think she had divined my thoughts, and had fixed upon Edith, by instinct, as an obstacle in her way.
‘Never mind the daughter,’ I said hastily, ‘but do come on Saturday afternoon, and see if I am not justified in liking the mother. I dare say they are not very rich, but they are not unpleasantly poor, or, if they are, they don’t make a show of it; and a little society, I am sure, would do her all the good in the world.’
This time Lady Isabella looked so intently at me, that I ventured to give the smallest little nod just to show her that I meant her to come. She took it up in a moment. Her face brightened all over. She made me a little gesture of thanks and satisfaction. And she put on instantly her old laughing, lively, satirical air.
‘Of course we shall come,’ she said, ‘even if this lady were not sick and poor. These qualities are great temptations to us, you are aware; but even if she were just like other people we should come.’
‘Well, Isabella!’ said Mrs. Spencer, ‘you who are so unwilling to go anywhere!’ but of course she could not help adding a civil acceptance of my invitation; and so that matter was settled more easily than I could have hoped.
I saw them the next day—once more by accident. We were both calling at the same house, and Lady Isabella seized the opportunity to speak to me. She drew me apart into a corner, on pretence of showing me something. ‘Look here,’ she said, with a flush on her face, ‘tell me, do you think me a fool—or worse? That is about my own opinion of myself.’