Маргарет Олифант
Old Mr. Tredgold
This is what Stella, for her part, is extremely well inclined to do. Somers has been filled with all the modern comforts, and it is universally allowed to be a beautiful old house, fit for a queen. Perhaps its present mistress does not altogether appreciate its real beauties, but she loves the size of it, and the number of guests it can take in, and the capacity of the hall for dances and entertainments of all kinds. She has, too, a little house in town—small, but in the heart of everything—which Stella instinctively and by nature is, wherever she goes. All that is facilitated by the possession of sixty thousand a year, yet not attained; for there are, as everybody knows, many people with a great deal more money who beat at these charmed portals of society and for whom there is no answer, till perhaps some needy lady of the high world takes them up. But Stella wanted no needy lady of quality. She scoffed at the intervention of the Dowager Lady Somers, who would, if she could, have patronised old Tredgold’s daughter; but Lady Somers’ set were generally old cats to Stella, and she owed her advancement solely to herself. She is success personified—in her house, in her dress, in society, with her husband and all her friends. Little whining Job was perhaps the only individual of all her surroundings who retained a feeling of hostility as time went on against young Lady Somers. Her sister has forgiven her freely, if there was anything to forgive, and Sir Charles is quite aware that he has nothing to forgive, and reposes serenely upon that thought, indifferent to flirtations, that are light as air and mean nothing. Lady Somers is a woman upon whose stainless name not a breath of malice has ever been blown, but Job does not care for his mother. It is a pity, though it does not disturb her much, and it is not easy to tell the reason—perhaps because she branded him in his infancy with the name which sticks to him still. Such a name does no harm in these days of nicknames, but it has, I believe, always rankled in the boy’s heart.
On the other hand, there is a great friendship still between Job and his father, and he does not dislike his aunt. But this is looking further afield than our story calls upon us to look. It is impossible that Katherine can remain very long in a half rural, half suburban cottage in the environs of Sliplin, with no diversion but the little pony carriage and the visits of the Midge and occasionally of Lady Jane. The piece of land which Mr. Sturgeon sold for her brought in a pleasant addition to her income, and she would have liked to have gone abroad and to have done many things; but what can be done, after all, by a lady and her maid, even upon five hundred pounds a year?
