“Please not a word! I am quite satisfied with papa’s will. I had intended to do—something of the sort myself, if I had ever had the power. You know, which is something pleasanter to talk of, that the Aurungzebe has been signalled, and I am going to meet Stella to-morrow.”
The two old ladies looked at each other. “And I suppose,” said Mrs. Shanks, “you will bring her home here.”
“Stella has seen a great deal since she was here,” said Miss Mildmay, “I should not think she would come, Katherine, if that is what you wish. She will like something more in the fashion—or perhaps more out of the fashion—in the grand style, don’t you know, like her husband’s old house. She will turn up her nose at all this, and at all of us, and perhaps at you too. Stella was never like you, Katherine. If she falls into a great fortune all at once there will be no bounds to her. She’ll probably sell this place, and turn you out.”
“She may not like the place, and neither do I,” said Katherine like a flash; “if she wishes to part with it I shall certainly not oppose her. You must not speak so of my sister.”
“And what shall you do, Katherine, my dear?”
“I am going away,” cried Katherine; “I have always intended to go away. I have a piece of land to build a cottage on.” She made a pause, for she had never in words stated her intentions before. “Papa knew what I should like,” she said, with the rising of a sob in her throat. The sense of injury now and then overcame even her self-control. “In the meantime perhaps we may go abroad, Hannah and I; isn’t it always the right thing when you are in mourning and trouble to go abroad?”
“My dear girl,” said Miss Mildmay solemnly, “how far do you think you can go abroad you and your maid—upon five hundred a year?”
“Can’t we?” said Katherine, confused; “oh, yes, we have very quiet ways. I am not extravagant, I shall want no carriage or anything.”
“Do you know how much a hotel costs, Katherine? You and your maid couldn’t possibly live for less than a pound a day—a pound a day means three hundred and sixty-five pounds a year—and that without a pin, without a shoe, without a bit of ribbon or a button for your clothes, still less with anything new to put on. How could you go abroad on that? It is impossible—and with the ideas you have been brought up on, everything so extravagant and ample—I can’t imagine what you can be thinking of, a practical girl like you.”
“She might go to a pension, Ruth Mildmay. Pensions are much cheaper than hotels.”