"Two thousand five hundred pounds, Miss Million."
"Lor'!" breathed the owner of this wealth. "And me that's been getting five pounds a quarter. That other's mine?"
"After a few necessary formalities, from which I anticipate no difficulties," said the old gentleman.
Some discussion of these formalities followed. In the midst of it I saw Million begin to fidget even more restlessly.
I frowned at her. This drew the attention of the old gentleman upon me. Million was murmuring something about, "Very sorry. Got to get back soon, Miss. Lunch to lay----"
Absurd Million! As if she would ever have to lay lunch again as long as she lived! Couldn't she realise the upheaval in her world? I gazed reproachfully at her.
The lawyer said to me quite pleasantly: "May I ask if you are a relation of Miss Million?"
Hereupon Miss Million shot at him a glance of outrage. "A relation? HER?" she cried. "The ideear!" Little Million's sense of "caste," fostered at the Soldiers' Orphanage, is nearly as strong as my Aunt Anastasia's. No matter if her secret day-dream has always been "to marry a gentleman." She was genuinely shocked that her old lawyer had not realised the relations between her little hard-working self and our family.
So she announced with simple dignity: "This is Miss Lovelace, the young lady where I am in service."
Million took me up sharply. "I haven't given notice, Miss. I'm not leaving."
"But, you absurd Million, of course you are," I said. "You can't go on living in Laburnum Grove now. You're a rich man's heiress----"
"Will that stop me living where I want? I'm all alone in the world," faltered Million, suddenly looking small and forlorn as she sat there by the big desk. "You're the only real friend I got in the world, Miss Beatrice. I always liked you. You always talked to me as if you was no more a young lady than what I was. D'you think----" Her voice shook. She seemed to have forgotten the presence of old Mr. Chesterton. "D'you think I'd a-stopped so long with your Aunt Nasturtium if it hadn't been for not wantin' to leave where you was? I'd be lost without you. I shouldn't know where to put myself, Miss. Oh, Miss!" There was a sob in her voice. "Don't say I got to go away from you! What am I to do with myself and all that money?" There was a perplexed silence.