A House in Bloomsbury _A House in Bloomsbury_ By MRS. OLIPHANT New York International Association of Newspapers and Authors 1901 COPYRIGHT, 1894, BY DODD, MEAD & COMPANY _All rights reserved._ NORTH RIVER BINDERY CO. PRINTERS AND BINDERS NEW YORK A HOUSE IN BLOOMSBURY. CHAPTER 1. “Father,” said Dora, “I am going upstairs for a little, to see Mrs. Hesketh, if you have no objection.” “And who is Mrs. Hesketh, if I might make so bold as to ask?” Mr. Mannering said, lifting his eyes from his evening paper. “Father! I told you all about her on Sunday--that she’s all alone all day, and sometimes her husband is so late of getting home. She is so lonely, poor little thing. And she is such a nice little thing! Married, but not so big as me.” “And who is---- her husband?” Mr. Mannering was about to say, but he checked himself. No doubt he had heard all about the husband too. He heard many things without hearing them, being conscious rather of the pleasant voice of Dora running on than of everything she said. This had, no doubt, been the case in respect to the young couple upstairs, of whose existence he had become dimly sensible by reason of meeting one or other of them on the stairs. But there was nothing in the appearance of either which had much attracted him. They appeared to him a commonplace couple of inferior kind; and perhaps had he been a man with all his wits keenly about him, he would not have allowed his child to run wild about the little woman upstairs. But Mr. Mannering did not keep his wits about him sharpened to any such point. Dora was a child, but also she was a lady, proof against any contamination of acquaintance which concerned only the letters of the alphabet. Her “h’s” could take care of themselves, and so could her “r’s". As for anything else, Mr. Mannering’s dreamy yet not unobservant eyes had taken in the fact that the young woman, who was not a lady, was an innocent and good little woman; and it had never occurred to him to be afraid of any chance influence of such a kind for his daughter. He acquiesced, accordingly, with a little nod of his head, and return of his mild eyes to his paper.