Page:The House of Mirth (1905).djvu/495

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THE HOUSE OF MIRTH

a minute—don't go yet; sit quiet and rest a little longer. You look thoroughly played out. And you haven't told me———" He broke off, conscious of going farther than he had meant. She saw the struggle and understood it; understood also the nature of the spell to which he yielded as, with his eyes on her face, he began again abruptly: "What on earth did you mean by saying just now that you were learning to be a milliner?"

"Just what I said. I am an apprentice at Regina's."

"Good Lord—you? But what for? I knew your aunt had turned you down: Mrs. Fisher told me about it. But I understood you got a legacy from her———"

"I got ten thousand dollars; but the legacy is not to be paid till next summer."

"Well, but—look here: you could borrow on it any time you wanted."

She shook her head gravely. "No; for I owe it already."

"Owe it? The whole ten thousand?"

"Every penny." She paused, and then continued abruptly, with her eyes on his face: "I think Gus Trenor spoke to you once about having made some money for me in stocks."

She waited, and Rosedale, congested with embarrassment, muttered that he remembered something of the kind.

"He made about nine thousand dollars," Lily pursued,

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