This particular calumny was well watered and manured with all these by-products of human life, and it grew to full size and height with a rapidity that could not have been attained under less favourable conditions.
BOOK IV
CHAPTER XXXII
ROSE SUMMONED TO LONDON
Rose was back in London the second week in July, summoned back rather imperiously by Mr. Murray, Junior. The house had been shut up since the departure of her tenants at Whitsuntide, and she had hoped not to reopen it until the autumn. She had intended to go directly to her mother's home in the country as soon as they could leave Paris. It was becoming a question whether it would be a greater risk for Lady Charlton to endure the heat in Paris or the fatigues of the long journey. Mr. Murray's letter decided them to move. Rose must go, and her mother would not stay behind alone. Lady Charlton decided to pay a month's visit to her youngest daughter in Scotland, as Rose might be kept in London.
It was a disappointment. The house in London would be nearly as stuffy as Paris. Rose disliked the season and was in no mood for the stale echoes of its dying excitements. She would not tell her friends that she was back; she would keep as quiet as she had been in Paris.
The first morning, after early service and breakfast, she went to the library to wait for the lawyer's visit. It was the only room in which to receive him; the dining-room, and drawing-room, and the little boudoir upstairs, were not opened. Rose was inclined to leave them as they were, with the furniture in brown wrappers, for the present; but she would rather have seen Mr. Murray in any room but the library.