She said she did not know; privately she felt there was no need for her to consider the question; was it not the one her self-invited brother had come to answer? He did answer it, almost as soon as he asked it.
"You will have to leave this house," he said, "sell what you can of its contents and pay all that is possible of your debts. You won't be able to pay many with that; the rest I shall have to arrange about, I suppose. Oh, not pay; don't think that for a moment; I've paid a deal more than I ought for you long ago. I mean to see the people and arrange that you pay by degrees; you will have to devote most of your income to that for a time. What will you live on in the meanwhile? This legacy—it is you who have got it, isn't it?" he said, turning to Julia; "I thought so. Fortunately the money is not in any way tied up, you can get at the principal. Well, the best thing to be done is to buy a good boarding-house. You could make a boarding-house pay, Caroline," he went on to his sister, "if you tried; your social gifts would be some use there—you will have to try."
Mrs. Polkington looked a little dismayed, and Violet said, "It would be rather degrading, wouldn't it?"
"Not so degrading as being sued at the county court," her uncle returned.
Mrs. Polkington felt there was truth in that, and, accustoming herself to a new idea with her usual rapidity, she even began to see that the alternative offered need not be so very unpleasant. Indeed, when she came to think about it, it might be almost pleasant if the boarding-house were very select; there would be society of a kind, perhaps of a superior kind, even; she need not lose prestige and she could still shine, and without such tremendous effort.
But her reflections were interrupted by the Captain.
"And what part have I in this scheme?" he asked.
His brother-in-law, to whom the question was addressed, considered a moment. "Well, I really don't know," he said at last; "of course you would live in the house."
"A burden on my wife and daughter! Idle, useless, not wanted!"
The banker had no desire to hurt Captain Polkington's feelings, but he saw no reason why he should not hear the truth—that he had long been all these things; idle, useless, unwanted, a burden not only to his wife and daughters, but also to all relations and connections who allowed themselves to be burdened. But the Captain's feelings were hurt; he was surprised and injured, though convinced of little besides the hardness of fate and the fact that his brother-in-law misunderstood him. He turned to his wife for support, and she supported, corroborating both what he said and what her brother did too, though they were diametrically opposed. It looked rather as if the discussion were going to wander off into side issues, but Julia brought it back by inquiring of her uncle—