This,--which would have
conferred upon her some tangible advantages, such as rank, and
wealth, and a great name,--she had refused, thinking that the price
to be paid for them was too high, and that life might even yet have
something better in store for her. After that she had permitted
herself to become, after a fashion, head nurse to the old man, and
in that pursuit had wasted three years of what remained to her of
her youth. People, at any rate, should not say of her that she had
accepted payment for the three years' service by taking a casket of
jewels. She would take nothing that should justify any man in saying
that she had been enriched by her acquaintance with the Duke of
Omnium. It might be that she had been foolish, but she would be more
foolish still were she to accept a reward for her folly. As it was
there had been something of romance in it,--though the romance of
friendship at the bedside of a sick and selfish old man had hardly
been satisfactory.
Even in her close connection with the present Duchess there was
something which was almost hollow.
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