Page:Eliot - Felix Holt, the Radical, vol. III, 1866.djvu/84

74 said Harold, again looking at Esther, "unless, indeed, you have had some previous intimation of it."

"Does it refer to law and inheritance?" said Esther, with a smile. She was already brightened by Harold's manner. The news seemed to be losing its chillness, and to be something really belonging to warm, comfortable, interesting life. "Then you have already heard of it?" said Harold, inwardly vexed, but sufficiently prepared not to seem so.

"Only yesterday," said Esther, quite simply "I received a letter from some lawyers with a statement of many surprising things, showing that I was an heiress" — here she turned very prettily to address Mrs Transome — "which, as you may imagine, is one of the last things I could have supposed myself to be."

"My dear," said Mrs Transome with elderly grace, just laying her hand for an instant on Esther's, "it is a lot that would become you admirably." Esther blushed, and said playfully,

"O, I know what to buy with fifty pounds a-year, but I know the price of nothing beyond that."

Her father sat looking at her through his spectacles, stroking his chin. It was amazing to herself