United States or Mongolia ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
But Lady Lorridaile had always remembered him tenderly, and though she feared he had made a rash marriage in America, she had been very angry when she heard how he had been cast off by his father and that no one really knew where or how he lived.
Lady Lorridaile put her hand on his shoulders, and after looking down into his upraised face a few seconds, kissed him warmly. "I am your Aunt Constantia," she said, "and I loved your poor papa, and you are very like him." Lady Lorridaile was delighted. She bent and kissed him again, and from that moment they were warm friends.
A few days before it took place, Sir Harry Lorridaile and Lady Lorridaile, who was the Earl's only sister, actually came for a visit a thing which caused the greatest excitement in the village and set Mrs. Dibble's shop-bell tinkling madly again, because it was well known that Lady Lorridaile had only been to Dorincourt once since her marriage, thirty-five years before.
As she shook hands with the Earl, she called him by the name she had not used since her girlhood. "What, Molyneux!" she said, "is this the child?" "Yes, Constantia," answered the Earl, "this is the boy. Fauntleroy, this is your grand-aunt, Lady Lorridaile." "How do you do, Grand-Aunt?" said Fauntleroy.
He was so sweet-tempered, light-hearted, spirited a lad, that when he went away, she had hoped to see him often again; but she never did, because the Earl had been in a bad humor when he went back to Dorincourt, and had forbidden him ever to go to Lorridaile Park again.
Those two elder sons, Bevis and Maurice, she had never seen; but once there had come to Lorridaile Park a tall, stalwart, beautiful young fellow about eighteen years old, who had told her that he was her nephew Cedric Errol, and that he had come to see her because he was passing near the place and wished to look at his Aunt Constantia of whom he had heard his mother speak.
We were told even at Lorridaile Park that your poorer tenants adore her already." "They adore HIM," said the Earl, nodding toward Fauntleroy. "As to Mrs. Errol, you'll find her a pretty little woman. I'm rather in debt to her for giving some of her beauty to the boy, and you can go to see her if you like.
And so by degrees Lady Lorridaile, too, heard of the child; she heard about Higgins and the lame boy, and the cottages at Earl's Court, and a score of other things, and she began to wish to see the little fellow. And just as she was wondering how it might be brought about, to her utter astonishment, she received a letter from her brother inviting her to come with her husband to Dorincourt.
The very next day she went to call upon Mrs. Errol. When she returned, she said to her brother: "Molyneux, she is the loveliest little woman I ever saw! She has a voice like a silver bell, and you may thank her for making the boy what he is. She has given him more than her beauty, and you make a great mistake in not persuading her to come and take charge of you. I shall invite her to Lorridaile."
As Lady Lorridaile had told him, her voice was very sweet, and her manner was very simple and dignified. She did not seem in the least troubled by his sudden coming. "Yes," said the Earl, "he is like my son too." He put his hand up to his big white mustache and pulled it fiercely. "Do you know," he said, "why I have come here?" "I have seen Mr. Havisham," Mrs.
Word Of The Day