"And if he were to ask for the reason, and say, 'Alice, are you not your own mistress, rich, free to do whatever you incline to do? Why should you call me a fool for loving you?'"
"Take my word for it, Bella, he 'll never risk the answer he 'd be sure to meet to such a speech," said the other, haughtily; and Isabella, who felt a sort of awe of her sister at certain moments, desisted from the theme. "Look! yonder they go, Maitland and Rebecca, not exactly arm-inarm, but with bent-down heads, and that propinquity that implies close converse."
"I declare I feel quite jealous,--I mean on your account, Bella," said Mrs. Trafford.
"Never mind _my_ interests in the matter, Alice," said she, reddening; "it is a matter of the most complete indifference to me with whom he walks or talks. Mr. Norman Maitland is not to me one whit more of consequence than is Tony Butler to my sister."
"That's a confession, Bella,--a confession wrung out of a hasty moment; for Tony certainly likes _me_, and _I_ know it."
"Well, then, the cases are not similar, for Mr. Maitland does not care for me; or, if he does, I don't know it, nor do I want to know it."
"Come, darling, put on your shawl, and let us have a breezy walk on the cliffs before the day darkens; neither of these gentlemen are worth the slightest estrangement between such sisters as we are. Whether Tony likes me or not, don't steal him from me, and I 'll promise you to be just as loyal with regard to the other. How I 'd like to know what they are talking of there!"
As it is not impossible the reader may in some slight degree participate in the fair widow's sentiment, we mean to take up the conversation just as it reached the time in which the remark was applied to it. Miss Becky Graham was giving her companion a sketchy description of all the persons then at the Abbey, not taking any especial care to be epigrammatic or picturesque, but to be literal and truthful.
"Mrs. Maxwell,--an old horror,--tolerated just because she owns Tilney Park, and can leave it to whom she likes; and the Lyles hope it will fall to Mark, or, possibly, to Bella. They stand to win on either."
"And which is the favorite?" asked Maitland, with a faint smile.
"You 'd like to think Isabella," said Miss Becky, with a sharp piercing glance to read his thoughts at an unguarded moment, if he had such, "but she is not. Old Aunt Maxwell--she 's as much your aunt as theirs--detests girls, and has, I actually believe, thoughts of marrying again. By the way, you said you wanted money; why not 'go in' there? eight thousand a-year in land, real estate, and a fine old house with some great timber around it."