“Poor Clara!” said Sir Robert. “She was always a frightened creature. When I recollect her, a poor little governess, keeping behind backs at the nursery parties—and to see her in all her splendour now!”
“She would keep behind backs still, if she could,” said Miss Dorset.
“Think of that, Ursula,” cried Sophy; “there is an example for you. She was a great deal worse off than you are; and to see her now, as papa says! You may have a house in Portland Place too, and ask us to balls, and wear diamonds. Think of that! Though last night you looked as frightened as she.”
“Don’t put such demoralizing ideas into the child’s head. How it is that girls are not ruined,” said Miss Dorset, shaking her head, “ruined! by such examples, I cannot tell. They must have stronger heads than we think. As poor as Cinderella one day, and the next as rich as the Queen—without any merit of theirs, all because some chance man happens to take a fancy to them.”
“Quite right,” said Sir Robert; “quite right, my dear. It is the natural course of affairs.”
Miss Dorset shook her head. She went on shaking her head as she poured out the tea. She was not given to eloquence, but the subject inspired her.
“Don’t think of it, Ursula; it is not the sort of thing that good girls ought to think of,” and the elder sister made signs to Sophy, who was reckless, and did not mind the moral effect of the suggestion.
“Poor Mrs. Copperhead! I shall never have a house in Portland Place, nor any diamonds, except Aunt Mary’s old brooch. I shall live and die an old maid, and nobody will waste a thought upon me,” said Sophy, who made this prophecy at her ease, not expecting it to come true; “but I don’t envy poor Clara, and if you marry such a man as Mr. Copperhead, though I shall admire you very much, Ursula, I shan’t envy you.”
“Is young Mr. Copperhead as bad as his father?” said Ursula, simply.
She was so far from thinking what meaning could be attached to her words, that she stopped and looked, wondering, from one to another when they laughed.
“Ha! ha! ha!” said Sir Robert; “not so bad, either!”
Poor Ursula was extremely serious. She turned with relief to Miss Dorset, who was serious too.
“My dear, we don’t know much about Clarence; he is a heavy young man. I don’t think he is attractive. Have you had a letter from the Parsonage this morning?” said Anne Dorset, with a very grave face; and as it turned out that Ursula had a letter, Miss Dorset immediately plunged into discussion of it. The girl did not understand why the simple little epistle should be so interesting, nor did she perceive yet what the laughter was about. To tell the truth, Ursula, who was not clever, had thought young Mr. Copperhead very nice. He had asked her to dance when nobody else did; he had talked to her as much as he could have talked to Sophy Dorset herself. He had rehabilitated her in her own eyes after the first disappointment and failure of the evening, and she was prepared to think, whatever might be said about the father, that the son was “very kind” and very agreeable. Why should they laugh? Ursula concluded that there must be some private joke of their own about Clarence (what a pretty, interesting, superior name Clarence was!) which she could not be permitted to know.
“If you talk like that,” said Anne Dorset to Sophy, “you will set her little head afloat about good matches, and spoil her too.”
“And a very good thing,” said Sophy. “If you had put the idea into my head, I should not be Sophy Dorset now. Why shouldn’t she think of a good match? Can she live there forever in that dreadful Parsonage, among all those children whom she does not know how to manage? Don’t be absurd, Anne; except an elder daughter like you here and there, you know, girls must marry if they are to be of any consequence in the world. Let them get it into their heads; we can’t change what is the course of nature, as papa says.”
“Oh, Sophy! it is so unwomanly.”
“Never mind; when a man chuckles and jeers at me because I am unmarried, I think it is unmanly; but they
