Turpin was red with suppressed indignation, but as usual she could not
look her lodger defiantly in the face.
'We're not so poor, miss,' she exclaimed, 'that we need send our daughters
into service,'
'Why, of course not, Mrs. Turpin, and that's one of the reasons why Lily
might suit this lady.'
But here was another rock of resistance which promised to give Miss Rodney
a good deal of trouble. The landlady's pride was outraged, and after the
manner of the inarticulate she could think of no adequate reply save that
which took the form of personal abuse. Restrained from this by more than
one consideration, she stood voiceless, her bosom heaving.
'Well, you shall think it over,' said Miss Rodney, 'and we'll speak of it
again in a day or two.'
Mrs. Turpin, without another word, took herself out of the room.
Save for that singular meeting on Miss Rodney's first night in the house,
Mr. Rawcliffe and the energetic lady had held no intercourse whatever.
Their parlours being opposite each other on the ground floor, they
necessarily came face to face now and then, but the High School mistress
behaved as though she saw no one, and the solicitor's clerk, after one or
two attempts at polite formality, adopted a like demeanour.
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