"
So saying, without giving his sisters time to reply, he walked hastily
to the door and went out. Miss Penfold and Miss Eleanor Penfold gazed
at each other in speechless astonishment. So accustomed were they to
settle everything that took place at Penfold Hall, that this sudden
assumption of authority on the part of their brother fairly staggered
them. Miss Penfold was the first to speak:
"This is terrible, Eleanor! To think that after all these years
Herbert's thoughts should still be turning toward that woman. But it
is only what might be expected. The ingratitude of men is terrible.
Here we have for the last twenty years been devoting our lives to
him--not only keeping his house for him, but seeing that he did not
fall a victim to any of the designing women who would have insinuated
themselves into his good graces, and preventing him from indulging in
all sorts of foolish tastes and bringing himself to ruin; and now you
see he turns again to that artful woman, and, without saying a word to
us, invites her son to come here. It is monstrous, sister!"
"It is monstrous," Miss Eleanor Penfold repeated, with tears in her
eyes. "It is like flying in the face of Providence, sister."
"It is flying in our faces," Miss Penfold replied sharply; "and just
at the present moment that is of more importance.
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