I shall not go on looking back. There are numbers of things that even now
make me raging to remember.
I have only been out for a year. Mrs. Carruthers got an attack of
bronchitis when I was eighteen, just as we were going up to town for the
season, and said she did not feel well enough for the fatigues, and off we
went to Switzerland. And in the autumn we travelled all over the place,
and in the winter she coughed and groaned, and the next season would not
go up until the last court, so I have only had a month of London. The
bronchitis got perfectly well--it was heart-failure that killed her,
brought on by an attack of temper because Thomas broke the Carruthers
vase. I shall not write of her death, or the finding of the will, or the
surprise that I was left nothing but a thousand pounds and a diamond ring.
Now that I am an adventuress, instead of an heiress, of what good to
chronicle all that! Sufficient to say if Mr. Carruthers does not obey his
orders and offer me his hand this afternoon, I shall have to pack my
trunks and depart by Saturday, but where to is yet in the lap of the gods.
He is coming by the 3.20 train, and will be in the house before four, an
ugly, dull time; one can't offer him tea, and it will be altogether
trying and exciting.
He is coming ostensibly to take over his place, I suppose, but in reality
it is to look at me, and see if in any way he will be able to persuade
himself to carry out his aunt's wishes.
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