"Oh, Felicia, you look so nice!"
She took up the silk of the dressing-gown and passed it through her
fingers covetously; then her tired eyes ran over the room, the white bed
standing ready, the dressing-table with its silver ornaments and flowers,
the chintz-covered sofas and chairs.
"Why shouldn't we be rich too?" she said angrily. "Your father is richer
than the Tathams. It's a wicked, wicked shame!"
Felicia put her hand to her head.
"Oh, do let me go to bed," she said in Italian.
Netta put her arm round her, supporting her. Presently they passed a
portrait on the wall, an enlarged photograph of a boy in cricketing
dress.
Underneath it was written:
"_Harry. Eton Eleven. July 189---_."
Felicia for the first time showed a gleam of interest. She stopped to
look at the picture.
"Who is it?"
"It must be her son, Lord Tatham."
The girl's sunken eyes seemed to drink in the pleasant image of the
English boy.
"Shall we see him?"
"Of course. To-morrow. Now come to bed!"
Felicia's head was no sooner on the pillow than she plunged into sleep.
Netta, on the other hand, was for a long time sleepless. The luxury of
the bed and the room was inexpressibly delightful and reviving to her.
Recollections of a small bare house in the Apuan Alps above Lucca, and of
all that she and Felicia had endured there, ran through her mind, mingled
with visions of Threlfall as she had known it of old, its choked
passages--the locked room from which she had stolen the Hermes--the
great table in Edmund's room with its litter of bric-a-brac--Edmund
himself.
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