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But you must not speak a word of it. I do not know it from himself." "How do you know it?" "Wait a moment. Sit down there, will you? and I will sit by you. No, Conway; do not take my hand. It is not right. There; so. Yesterday Mrs Van Siever was here. I need not tell you all that she said to me, even if I could. She was very harsh and cruel, saying all manner of things about Dobbs.
He was beginning to think what he would say in answer to the accusation now made, when his eager ear caught the sound of her step upon the stairs; and before the pause in the conversation which the circumstances admitted had given place to the necessity for further speech, Miss Van Siever had knocked at the door and had entered the room.
"Is the welfare of your friend nothing to you? Would you like to see him become the victim of the artifice of such a girl as Clara Van Siever?" "Upon my word I think he is very well able to take care of himself." "And would you wish to see that poor creature's domestic hearth ruined and broken up?" "Which poor creature?" "Dobbs Broughton, to be sure."
Indeed, it might have been surmised, from a word or two which Mrs Broughton allowed to escape, that she considered poor Conway to be more than ordinarily afflicted in that way. Miss Van Siever at first only pouted, and said that there was nothing in it.
There was something which made Clara unwilling even to name the man whom her mother had publicly proposed as her future husband. "He isn't Mr Broughton's partner," said Mrs Van Siever. "Mr Broughton has not got a partner. Mr Musselboro is the head of the firm. And as to your marrying him, of course, I can't make you." "No, mamma, you cannot."
At this moment, as the rent canvas fell and fluttered upon the stretcher, there came a loud voice of lamentation from the sofa, a groan of despair and a shriek of wrath. "Very fine indeed," said Mrs Van Siever. "When ladies faint they always ought to have their eyes about them. I see that Mrs Broughton understands that." "Take her away, Conway for God's sake take her away," said Mrs Broughton.
"Mr Musselboro will be here directly," said Mrs Van Siever, as she was starting for Mrs Broughton's house. "You had better tell him to come to me there; or, stop, perhaps you had better keep him here till I come back. Tell him to be sure and wait for me." "Very well, mamma. I suppose he can wait below?" "Why should he wait below?" said Mrs Van Siever, very angrily.
"There is something in it, my dear, certainly," said Mrs Dobbs Broughton; "and there can be no earthly reason why there should not be a great deal in it." "There is nothing in it," said Miss Van Siever, impetuously; "and if you will continue to speak of Mr Dalrymple in that way, I must give up the picture."
Mrs Van Siever in her present habiliments was not a thing so terrible to look at as she had been in her wiggeries at Mrs Dobbs Broughton's dinner-table. Her curls were laid aside altogether, and she wore simply a front beneath her close bonnet, and a very old front, too, which was not loudly offensive because it told no lies.
Or he'll give you his note-of-hand at fourteen days for the whole." "Bother his note-of-hand. Why should I take his note-of-hand?" "Do as you like, Mrs Van Siever." "It's the interest on my own money. Why don't he give it me? I suppose he has had it." "You must ask him that, Mrs Van Siever. You're in partnership with him, and he can tell you. Nobody else knows anything about it.
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