"I can sing a little but my voice has not been well trained."
"That is a pity. Now should you mind reading us a page or two?" And she handed her a novel that was lying open on the table.
Waveney flushed, but she took the book at once. For the first few minutes her voice trembled: then she thought of the new gown she wanted to buy for Mollie at Christmas, and then it grew steady.
"Miss Ward reads very nicely, does she not, Aunt Sara?" was Miss Harford's approving comment. "I think Althea will be pleased." Then turning to Waveney with a pleasant smile that lit up her homely features as sunshine lights up a granite rock, "I really see no reason why we should not come to terms. I do not know what we ought to offer you, Miss Ward, but my sister thought fifty pounds a year."
Waveney gave a little start of surprise. The terms seemed magnificent.
"Oh," she said, impulsively, "I shall be able to help father. What happiness that will be!" And then her face fell a little. "Will you tell me, please, is it very far to Erpingham?"
"No, not exactly. I am thinking of my own home. We live in Cleveland Terrace, Chelsea." Then Miss Harford seemed somewhat taken aback.
"Is your father's name Everard Ward?" she asked, abruptly.
"Oh, yes,--have you heard of him?" returned Waveney, _naively_. "He is an artist, but his pictures do not sell, and he has only his drawing lessons. That is why I want to help him, because he works so hard and looks so tired; and Mollie--that is my sister--is a little lame, and cannot do much."
"Is that all your family? You do not speak of your mother."
Miss Harford was looking at the girl a little strangely.
"She is dead," returned Waveney, in a low voice; "she died when Mollie and I were ten years old, but there is a young brother, Noel."
"Aunt Sara, I really think it would be best for Althea to see Miss Ward herself. You know I have to drive over to Erpingham now. It is quite early in the afternoon," she continued, looking at Waveney. "Can you not come with me? We shall be at the Red House in three-quarters of an hour. I could drop you at Sloane Square station by seven. It will be a pleasant drive, and the evenings are still light until eight."
Waveney hesitated. What would Mollie say to her long absence? But then, her father never returned home before eight on his Norwood days. The drive tempted her, and then, the idea of seeing Erpingham.