ng girl from
London, who had bequeathed her good looks to her two children. She, or
rather her husband--for little Mrs Clay had no voice in the matter--had
sent the boy to Eton and then to Cambridge, and the girl to what her
mother called a ''igh-class, fashionable school'--which, if high prices
are any criterion, it certainly was.

Mrs Clay shook her head at her son's last remark. 'I should never 'ave
made a duchess. I was always timid, an' couldn't 'old up my 'ead as
Sairey does. It's somethin' in you both, though I don't 'old wi' Sairey
speakin' of 'er father in the way she does.'

'I should think not, indeed,' put in her son.

'Still, we can't expect 'er to respect us as much as she would if we 'ad
the same good manners an' way o' talkin' that she an' you 'ave. It's
natural she should feel superior, an' show it, too,' argued the poor
woman with some shrewdness; 'an' I've told your dad that it was only w'at
'e might 'ave expected.'

'Pray, don't talk of Sarah's manners being good, nor her way of talking
either; they're both as bad as bad can be,' said George Clay, with his
soft drawl.

'W'y, you don't never mean to say that, George, an' after all the pounds
dad's paid for 'er? For goodness' sake, don't tell 'im, or 'e'll
'alf-kill 'er--'e would! You don't know your father as I do,' cried the
mother in consternation.

An expression of annoyance came over her son's face at these words.
'Don't make the pater out worse than he is, my dear mother. He may be
violent at times, but I hope he knows better than to use physical force.
Anyway, I shall not tell him anything of the sort, and when I say her
manners are bad and her language unlady-like'----

'But that's just w'at 'e thinks it isn't; an' though 'e gets angry, 'e
thinks a lot o' 'er. An' w'en I don't like the words she uses sometimes,
'e says I don't know the way o' society; that the aristocracy speak like
that, an' be'ave so, too.'

'Well, so they do, some of them,' admitted her son.

But before he could finish his remark his mother interrupted him. 'Well,
then, that's w'at 'e wants; so if you tell 'im that, dear, 'e'll be in a
good temper for the rest o' the evenin'.' She looked wistfully at her son
as she made this suggestion.

He laughed good-humouredly. 'All right, mother; if Sarah gives him some
of her cheek to-night I'll tell him it's the fashion of the day. It's
true enough; but, oh dear! I wish you wouldn't have such fearfully long
dinners. That'