She threw out her hands with a curious stagy gesture that was yet a natural one, and her nostrils seemed to dilate, as if she were actually sniffing the atmosphere she so much desired. "I'm going," she said. "I don't care what she says."
"I don't see why you shouldn't go," said Mrs. Grant. "But why should Lady Brent object? What can she say?"
Mrs. Brent leant forward. "Couldn't you ask her for me?" she said coaxingly. "Tell her you think I ought to have a change. I'm young, you know. At least I'm not old yet. It can't be right for me to be buried down here year after year. I shan't get into mischief. Just a week!"
Mrs. Grant felt intensely uncomfortable. Get into mischief! What _did_ it all mean? Lady Brent must have some reason for keeping the frivolous pathetic little thing shut up like this? And yet she had seemed to disclose everything; she had dropped every trace of pretence, and had made her appeal for sympathy on the grounds of her very unsuitability to be where she was. If she no longer cared, before this friend, to keep up the fiction of having sprung from a superior station in life, which from such as she was a great concession to candour, how could she wish to keep anything back?
"You know I'm your friend," Mrs. Grant said. "I'd do anything I could to help you, but you see how it is with us here. We shall never be close friends with Lady Brent; I don't think she wants it. But she's kind and well-disposed towards us. I couldn't run the risk of setting her against us, unless I were _quite_ certain that--I mean quite certain of my ground. It wouldn't be fair to my husband. It would make all the difference to us here if we were not on good terms with her. Have you told me everything? _Why_ should she think you might get into mischief?"
She put this aside lightly. "Oh, there's nothing in that. It's only what she'd say. She'd say anything. But I see I ought not to ask you. No, it wouldn't be fair to bring you into it. She'd have it up against you; you're quite right. I tell you this, Mrs. Grant; when Harry comes of age--or before that, when he goes to Sandhurst--I'm off. No more of this for me. I shall snap my fingers at her. But of course you've got to stay here. No, I'll tackle her myself, and see if I can't get my own way for once."