By this time Lady Bell had recovered herself. “Very well, madam, it is a question for you to decide,” she said, steadying her mobile face and trembling voice, by a force put upon them, which obtained Mrs. Siddons’s approbation. She could almost have wished that Miss Barlowe had gone on the boards, but then, though she had emitted no other spark of histrionic ability, she might have grown, what with her fresher, more tender youth, the mystery of her concealed rank, and her unmistakable air of distinction, a dangerous rival. The woman who knew her own genius was too great to be morbidly vain and jealous, but she had extortionate children. CHAPTER XVI. COMPANION TO MISS KINGSCOTE. “Will you be so good as to tell me the arrangements which you have made for me?” requested Lady Bell, remembering that as her money was lost, it was out of her power to undo these arrangements. “With all my heart, my dear,” replied Mrs. Siddons cordially. She was thankful to have discharged an ungracious task, though she had not for a moment been uncertain of her obligation, so that her serenity had only been slightly ruffled. “The lady who wishes a companion at so vastly opportune a moment, that we ought to be grateful for the chance, and I see that you have the sense to regard it in that light, is Miss Kingscote, of Nutfield, three miles from here. She had come in to see the play on Friday night, and spoke of the opening to Mrs. Bunbury, who mentioned it to me.” “Do you know anything more?” asked Lady Bell, feigning curiosity to hide how dispirited she was. “Yes, sure; I have made every inquiry on your account,” said Mrs. Siddons readily. “I took the opportunity to ride out to Nutfield when you were engaged with the trimming of the pink train, yesterday. It is a nice sort of country place, though I must explain that the family were thrown back in the world by the villany of an uncle, and are only working their way forward again, which is greatly to their credit. I thought it better that you should not know of the proposal till it was all settled, which it is, with your consent.” “I should like to hear what my duties will be.” “Ay, and what your salary will be; don’t forget that, and don’t begin blushing at the name, child, not though it were ‘wages.’ It is easy to see that you have not been so hardened as I. But ‘what’s in a name?’ especially when the price of our hire is for the benefit of the helpless creatures dearest to us! Oh, I forget, Miss Barlowe, you are not sixteen, and still a spinster; indeed I don’t recommend early marriages, and you will have plenty opportunities yet to change your name. But a married woman is apt to measure her neighbour’s obligations by her own.” “Is there only one Miss Kingscote?” interposed Lady Bell.