Mr. Laurence Fairfax insisted that his niece should live at Abbotsmead,
and continue in possession of the white suite until she was of age. He
was her guardian, and would take no denial.
"It wants but three months to that date," she told him.
"Your home is here until you marry, Elizabeth," he rejoined in a tone
that forbade contradiction. "You shall visit Lady Latimer, but subject
to permission. Remember you are a Fairfax. Though you may go back to the
Forest, it is a delusion to imagine that you can live comfortably in the
crowded household where you were happy as a child. You have been six
years absent; three of them you have spent in the luxurious ease of
Abbotsmead. You have acquired the tastes and habits of your own class--a
very different class. You must look to me now: your pittance is not
enough for the common necessaries of life."
"Not so very different a class, Uncle Laurence, and fortunately I am not
in bondage to luxurious ease," Bessie said. "But I will not be perverse.
Changes come without seeking, and I am of an adaptable disposition. The
other day I was supposed to be a great heiress--to-day I have no more
than a bare competence."
"Not even that, but if you marry suitably you may be sure that I shall
make you a suitable settlement," rejoined her kinsman. Bessie speculated
in silence and many times again what her uncle Laurence might mean by
"suitably," but they had no explanation, and the occasion passed.
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