“Like poor Anne?”

“No, not out of mere moping and want of intellect, like Anne.  But Lady Tyrrell says she feels for her; she was brought a great deal too forward, and was made quite mistress of the house at Rockpier, being her father’s darling and all, and now it is trying to her, though it is quite wholesome, to be in her proper place.  It is a pity she is so bitter over it, and flies off her own way.”

“That boy!” said Rosamond; “I hope she does something for his good.”

“She teaches him, I believe; but there’s another instance of her strange ways.  She was absolutely vexed when Lady Tyrrell took him into the house, though he was her protege, only because it was not done in her way.  It is a great trial to Camilla.”

“I could fancy a reason for that,” said Rosamond.  “Julius does not like the tone of the household at all.”  But she added hastily, “Who could those children be?  They did not look quite like poor children.”

“Ah! she is always taking up with some odd person in her own away,” said Cecil.  “But here we are.  Will you drive on to the hotel, or get out here?”

When, at the end of two hours, the sisters-in-law met at the work-room, and Rosamond had taken a survey of the row of needle-women, coming up one by one to give their work, be paid and dismissed, there was a look of weariness and vexation on Cecil’s face.  She had found it less easy to keep order and hinder gossip, and had hardly known how to answer when that kind lady, Mrs. Miles Charnock, had been asked after; but she would have scorned to allow that she had missed her assistant, and only politely asked how Rosamond had sped.

“Oh! excellently.  People were so well advised as to be out, so I paid off all my calls.”

“You did not return your calls without Julius?”

“There’s nothing he hates so much.  I would not have dragged him with me on any account.”

“I think it is due to one’s self.”

“Ah! but then I don’t care what is due to myself.  I saw a friend of yours, Cecil.”

“Who?”

“Mrs. Duncombe,” said Rosamond.  “I went to Pettitt’s—­the little perfumer, you know, that Julius did so much for at the fire; and there she was, leaning on the counter, haranguing him confidentially upon setting an example with sanatory measures.”

“Sanitary,” corrected Cecil; “sanitas is health, sano to cure.  People never know the difference.”

“Certainly I don’t,” said Rosamond.  “It must be microscopic!”

“Only it shows the difference between culture and the reverse,” said Cecil.

“Well, you know, I’m the reverse,” said Rosamond, leaning sleepily back, and becoming silent; but Cecil was too anxious for intelligence to let her rest, and asked on what Mrs. Duncombe was saying.

“I am not quite sure—­she was stirring up his public spirit, I think, about the drainage; and they were both of them deploring the slackness and insensibility of the corporation, and canvassing for Mr. Whitlock, as I believe.  It struck me as a funny subject for a lady, but I believe she does not stick at trifles.”