e Mr.
Deyncourt the most, and to have a sense that there was satisfaction in
that to which he could lead her, while the better taste that had grown in
her was sometimes offended, almost insulted, by Tom Brady's tendency to
coarseness, and to treating her not as a lady, but as the Westhaven belle
he had honoured with his attentions two years before. Yet she had an old
kindness for him as her first love. And, moreover, he could give her
eventually a title and very considerable wealth, a house in London, and
all imaginable gaiety. While, as to Mr. Deyncourt, he was not poor and
had expectations, but the utmost she could look to for him with
confidence was Northmoor Vicarage after Mr. Woodman's time, and anywhere
the dull, sober, hard-working life of a clergyman's wife!

Which should she choose--that is, if she had her choice, or if either
were in earnest? She was not sure of the curate, and therefore perhaps
longed most that he should come to the point, feeling that this would
anyway increase her self-esteem, and if she hesitated to bind herself to
a life too high, and perhaps too dull, there was the dread, on the other
hand, that his family, who, she understood, were very grand people, would
object to a girl with nothing of her own and a governess sister.

On the other hand, the Bradys were so rich that they had little need to
care for fortune--only, the richer people were, the greater their
expectations--and she was more at ease with Tom than with Mr. Deyncourt.
They would probably condone the want of fortune if she could write
'Honourable' before her name, or had any prospect of so doing, and the
governess-ship might be a far greater drawback in their eyes than in
those of the Deyncourts. 'However, thank goodness,' said she to herself,
'that won't begin for two or three years, and one or other will be hailed
long before that--if-- Oh, it is very hard to be kept out of everything
by an old stick like Uncle Frank and a little wretch like Mite, who,
after all, is a miserable Tyrolese, and not a Morton at all! It really
is too bad!'

CHAPTER XXIX
JONES OR RATTLER

When Lord Northmoor had occasion to be in London he usually went alone,
for to take the whole party was too expensive, and not good for little
Michael. Besides, Bertha Morton had so urgently begged him to regard her
house as always ready for him, that the habit had been established of
taking up his quarters there.

Some important measures wer