“You mean her fortune, Mr. Trevor. Dear child, give me a cup of tea. You think it is not a bad thing to talk so much to her about her fortune?”
“No, ma’am,” said the old man; “on the contrary, the very best thing possible. It would be too great a weight for any one not used to it. You know it fills my mind night and day. I’ve got to prepare her for it, and put all straight for her as far as I can. There is many a great person that has not the weight on her shoulders that little thing will have, and that is why I sent for you.”
“Asked me to come and take tea,” said Mrs. Stone, smiling.
“No sugar, my dear. Yes, no doubt we have to train her for her future responsibilities. I do it by trying to make her a good girl, Mr. Trevor, and I think I have succeeded,” the lady added, putting her hand affectionately on the girl’s shoulder. Lucy, standing between the two, with the cup of tea in one hand and a plateful of cake in the other, looked as completely unexcited by all this talk about her, and as unlike a personage of vast importance, as personages of importance often contrive to do.
“She is a good girl by nature,” said her father somewhat sharply. “I want to tell, ma’am, of a trust I have appointed you to in my will along with others,” he added hastily—“along with others. I have arranged that in case of Lucy’s marriage—”
“Had not you better step down-stairs a little, my dear, and just see whether Jane is waiting in the hall?” Mrs. Stone said hurriedly. “Perhaps Mrs. Ford would allow her, as it is so cold, to go down-stairs.”
“You need not send her away,” said old Trevor grimly, “she knows all about it. I don’t want her to be taken by surprise when I die. I want her to know all that is in store for her.”
“But about her marriage, my dear Mr. Trevor; at seventeen these ideas come too quickly of themselves.”
“I’ll tell you, ma’am, Lucy is not like common girls,” he said testily; “when a woman’s in a great position, she has to learn many things that otherwise might be kept from her. What had the queen to do, I would like to know? Settle all her marriage herself, whatever any one might think.”
“Poor young lady! I used to hear my mother say that her heart bled for her. But you don’t compare our Lucy with her majesty, Mr. Trevor! Dear Lucy! though she were the richest girl in England, it would still be a little different from the queen.”