'In a high state of preservation. And how are you? You don't look quite the thing.'
'He would not call him so to his face!' thought the wife. 'Oh! I wish he would sit anywhere but in Arthur's chair, and not fidget me with playing with that horrid little piece of watch-chain!' 'He is very well, thank you. He had a bad cold last week, but it is quite gone now. I hope he will soon come in.'
'I am not sorry to have found you alone. I want to hear something of these relations of yours.'
'Oh! I shall be sure to say something wrong!' thought she, and as the best thing to put forward, announced that they would soon be in London.
'And they are not high with you? I hear fine accounts of their grandeur,--they say the lady and her daughter are eaten up with pride, and think no one fit to speak to.'
'Miss Martindale has the plainest ways in the world. She will do anything for the poor people.'
'Ay, ay, that's the way with fine ladies,--they like to be condescending and affable. And so you say they receive you well? make you one of the family--eh?'
Violet hoped it was not wrong to utter a faint 'yes.'
'No; she does not write letters much. But I told you how very kind they are--Mr. Martindale, his brother, especially.'
'Ay!' said Albert, 'he disconcerted our calculations. He seems to have taken out a new lease.'
'But he has no lungs left. His life can't be worth a year's purchase, by what the governor heard. He would never have let Martindale have you on such easy terms if he had not looked on you as good as her ladyship.'
Such shame and disgust came over Violet that she felt unworthy to sit on John Martindale's chair, and moved to the sofa, trying to change the subject; but Albert persisted in inquiries about Mr. Martindale's age, health, and the likelihood of his marrying, till she could no longer be without the perception that not only had her husband been to blame for their marriage--her father's part had been far worse.
Albert hoped the old lord was coming down handsomely and tried to make her tell their income. She was glad not to know and he began calculating it from their style of living, with such disregard to her feelings, as made her contrast his manners with those of the true gentlemen to whom she was now accustomed, and feel sadly that there was reason in her husband's wish to keep her family at a distance. There was no checking or silencing this elder brother; she could only feel humiliated by each proof of his vulgarity of mind, and blame herself, by turns, for churlishness to him, and for permitting conversation Arthur would so much dislike.