Booksellers and bookselling -- England -- Fiction; Families -- Fiction; Inheritance and succession -- Fiction
"Clara's cousin," she said, "I have forgotten your name; but how do
you do, again?"
And then they went in to dinner.
"You have learned, I suppose," said Arnold, "something about the
Deseret family by this time?"
"Oh, yes, I have heard all about the family-tree. I dare say I shall
get to know it by heart in time. But you don't expect me all at once,
to care much for it."
"Little Republican!" said Clara. "She actually does not feel a pride
in belonging to a good old family."
The girl made a little gesture.
"Your family can't do much for you, that I can see, except to make you
proud, and pretend not to see other women in the shop. That is what
the county ladies do."
"Why, my dear, what on earth do you know of the county ladies?"
Lotty blushed a little. She had made a mistake. But she quickly
recovered.
"I only know what I've read, cousin, about any kind of English ladies.
But that's enough, I'm sure. Stuck-up things!"
And again she observed, from Clara's pained expression, that she had
made another mistake.
If she showed a liking for stout at lunch, she manifested a positive
passion for champagne at dinner.
"I do like the English custom," she said, "of having two dinners in
the day."
"Ladies in America, I suppose," said Clara, "dine in the middle of the
day?"
"Always."
"But I have visited many families in New York and Boston who dined
late," said Arnold.
"Dare say," she replied carelessly. "I'm going to have some more of
that curry stuff, please. And don't ask any more questions, anybody,
till I've worried through with it. I'm a wolf at curry."
"She likes England, Arnold," said Clara, covering up this remark, so
to speak. "She likes the country, she says, very much."
"At all events," said the girl, "I like this house, which is
first-class--fine--proper. And the furniture, and pictures, and
all--tiptop. But I'm afraid it is going to be awful dull, except at
meals, and when the Boy is going." Her own head was just touched by
the "Boy," and she was a little off her guard.
"My dear child," said Clara, "you have only just come, and you have
not yet learned to know and love your own home and your father's
friends. You must take a little time."
"Oh, I'll take time. As long as you like. But I shall soon be tired of
sitting at home. I want to go about and see things--theaters and
music-halls, and all kinds of places."
"Ladies, in England, do not go to music-halls," said Arnold.
"Gentlemen do. Why not ladies, then? Answer me that. Why can't ladies
go, when gentlemen go? What is proper for gentlemen is proper for
ladies. Very well, then, I want to go somewhere every night. I want to
see everything there is to see, and to hear all that there is to
hear."
"We shall go, presently, a good deal into society," said Clara
timidly. "Society will come back to town very soon now--at least, some
of it."
"Oh, yes, I dare say. Society! No, thank you, with company manners. I
want to laugh, and talk, and enjoy myself."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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