"
"Well, what am I to do?" asked Bridget, as he sat silent.
"I'm blessed if I know," he answered, and at once rose to his feet.
He saw that she was profoundly disappointed, and although it appeared
plain enough that the transaction would in any case be regarded by her
as mainly mercantile, he fancied that she would have been in other ways
delighted if his answer had been different.
"Neither do I," she said, with a sigh, "unless I make up my mind to
gratify Colonel Faversham. Why shouldn't I? Look upon this picture
and on this. A year or two at the outside, and on the one hand I find
myself without a penny. On the other, I have only to say the word and
I make certain, as soon as I please, of a fair income, a good house and
an excellent position in society; because, you know, I could hold my
own. You see me here living through a kind of interregnum. I am just
nobody! But in Paris and other places it used to be different, and so
I intend it to be again. What else is there? You make an immense
mistake if you imagine me as a governess or anything of that kind.
What could I teach?"
"Anyhow," answered Mark, holding out his hand, "you need not do
anything impetuously.
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