“Nothing, unless you mean to marry him. You are like myself, hardly the kind of woman to live in comparative poverty. Of course John would make a good settlement, when you——”
“John can wait till he is asked. I certainly should never think of accepting anything from a man who is being treated so badly by my sister.”
“Ethel, you are impertinent,” Lady Mildred replied angrily.
“Perhaps so, but I was only paying you back in your own coin. But don’t let us quarrel, dear. I can see that John is utterly miserable, and you don’t strike me as being a very happy woman. Ah, here is ‘King Baby.’ Give him to me, nurse,” Lady Ethel cried eagerly and held out her arms.
The nurse retired, and Lady Mildred watched her sister as she held the child in her arms, crooning the while a lullaby.
“Mildred, you ought to be the happiest woman in the world. You’ve a husband who adores you, and this mite of humanity. I would give my soul to have such a wee little thing clutching at me and knowing that it was mine,” Lady Ethel said impulsively.
“You are right, dear. I ought to be happy, yet I am utterly miserable. Give me the baby.”
And if the fashionable world could have seen Lady Mildred take the child in her arms with the love-light of a mother in her eyes, they would have wondered greatly.
Tears glistened on her lashes, and her bosom rose and fell quickly. She was crying quietly and could have given no reason why she wept, for knowledge had not yet come. But Lady Ethel knew, and would have spoken but instinct bade her keep silent; so she crossed over, and gently kissed her sister.
“Let us send for nurse to take baby and we will go down-stairs. They are all in the library,” she said gently, and Lady Mildred did not resist.