A great curiosity had been awakened in the county, and visitors came from distances greater than such as ordinarily include usual calls.  Naturally, one was curious about the daughter of the Vanderpoel who was a sort of national institution in his own country.  His name had not been so much heard of in England when Lady Anstruthers had arrived but there had, at first, been felt an interest in her.  But she had been a failure—­a childish-looking girl—­whose thin, fair, prettiness had no distinction, and who was obviously overwhelmed by her surroundings.  She had evidently had no influence over Sir Nigel, and had not been able to prevent his making ducks and drakes of her money, which of course ought to have been spent on the estate.  Besides which a married woman represented fewer potentialities than a handsome unmarried girl entitled to expectations from huge American wealth.

So the carriages came and came again, and, stately or unstately far-off neighbours sat at tea upon the lawn under the trees, and it was observed that the methods and appointments of the Court had entirely changed.  Nothing looked new and American.  The silently moving men-servants could not have been improved upon, there was plainly an excellent chef somewhere, and the massive silver was old and wonderful.  Upon everybody’s word, the change was such as it was worth a long drive merely to see!

The most wonderful thing, however, was Lady Anstruthers herself.  She had begun to grow delicately plump, her once drawn and haggard face had rounded out, her skin had smoothed, and was actually becoming pink and fair, a nimbus of pale fine hair puffed airily over her forehead, and she wore the most charming little clothes, all of which made her look fifteen years younger than she had seemed when, on the grounds of ill-health, she had retired into seclusion.  The renewed relations with her family, the atmosphere by which she was surrounded, had evidently given her a fresh lease of life, and awakened in her a new courage.

When the summer epidemic of garden parties broke forth, old Doby gleefully beheld, day after day, the Court carriage drive by bearing her ladyship and her sister attired in fairest shades and tints “same as if they was flowers.”  Their delicate vaporousness, and rare colours, were sweet delights to the old man, and he and Mrs. Welden spent happy evenings discussing them as personal possessions.  To these two Betty was a personal possession, bestowing upon them a marked distinction.  They were hers and she was theirs.  No one else so owned her.  Heaven had given her to them that their last years might be lighted with splendour.

On her way to one of the garden parties she stopped the carriage before old Doby’s cottage, and went in to him to speak a few words.  She was of pale convolvulus blue that afternoon, and Doby, standing up touching his forelock and Mrs. Welden curtsying, gazed at her with prayer in their eyes.  She had a few flowers in her hand, and a book of coloured photographs of Venice.