“He will be as well off as he has any right to be,” said old Trevor. “I’ve laid by a little. Don’t trouble yourself about Jock. What have you been doing to-day? That is the thing of the greatest importance. I want to know all my little lady is about.”
“We had our French lesson,” said Lucy, a little disturbed under her smooth surface; but the disturbance was so little that her father never found it out, “and—all the rest just as usual, papa.”
“And can you understand what mounsheer says? Can you talk to him? I used to know a few words myself, but never to talk it,” said the old man. His acuteness seemed to have deserted him, and turned into the most innocent simplicity—a little glow came upon his face. He was almost childishly excited on this point.
“A few words were enough for me—what did I want with French?—though things are altered now; and it’s taught, I’m told, in every commercial academy, and the classics neglected. That wasn’t the way in my time. If a boy learned anything besides reading and writing it was Latin; and I was considered very successful with my Latin.”
“That is another thing, papa,” said Lucy; “don’t you think Jock should go to school?”
Old Trevor’s face extended slightly. “Have you nothing to say to me, Lucy, but about Jock?”
“Oh, yes, a great deal,” said the girl. She did not lose a single change in his face, though she kept on steadily with her knitting, and she saw it was not safe to go further. She changed the subject at once. “Monsieur says I get on very well,” she said; “but not so well as Katie Russell. She is first in almost everything. She is so clever. You should hear her chatter French—as fast! It is like the birds in the trees, as pretty to listen to—and just as little sense that you can make out.”
“Yes, yes, yes!” said the old man, with a little impatience, “There is no occasion for you to learn like that, Lucy. She has to make her living by it, that girl. I wonder now, you that are in so very different a position, why it’s always this Russell girl you talk about, and never any of the real ladies, the Honorable Miss Barringtons and Lady—what do you call her?—and the better sort. It was for them I sent you to Mrs. Stone’s school, Lucy,” he said, with a tone of reproach.
“Yes, papa. I like them very well—they are just like me. They do as little work as they can, and get off everything they can. We had a famous ride—but that was yesterday. I told you about it. Lily Barrington’s horse ran away, or we thought it ran away; and mine set off at such a pace! I was dreadfully frightened, but Lily liked it. She had done it on purpose, fancy! and thinks there is nothing in the world so delightful as a gallop.”
“And you call her Lily?” said Mr. Trevor, with a glow of pleasure; “that’s right, my dear. That’s what I like to hear. Not that I want you to neglect the others, Lucy; but you can always get a hold on the poor; no fear of them; I want you to secure the great ones, too. I want you to know all sorts. You ought to with your prospects. I was saying to Ford to-day a girl with your prospects belongs to England. The country has an interest in you, Lucy. You ought to know all sorts, rich and poor. That is just what I have been settling,” he said, laying his hand on the blotting-book now closed, in which his papers were.