"
"I mean that it is very nice for Lady Eversleigh to have a cousin who
is so accomplished a musician."
"A cousin?"
"Yes. Mr. Carrington is Lady Eversleigh's cousin--is he not? Or, I beg
your pardon, perhaps he is her brother. I don't know your wife's maiden
name."
"My wife's maiden name was Milford," answered the baronet, with some
displeasure in his tone. "And Mr. Carrington is neither her brother nor
her cousin; he is no relation whatever to her."
"Indeed!" exclaimed Miss Graham.
There was a strange significance in that word "indeed"; and after
having uttered it, the young lady seemed seized with a sudden sense of
embarrassment.
Sir Oswald looked at her sharply; but her face was half averted from
him, as if she had turned away in confusion. "You seem surprised," he
said, haughtily, "and yet I do not see anything surprising in the fact
that my wife and Mr. Carrington are not related to each other."
"Oh, dear no, Sir Oswald; of course not," replied Lydia, with a light
laugh, which had the artificial sound of a laugh intended to disguise
some painful embarrassment. "Of course not. It was very absurd of me to
appear surprised, if I did really appear so; but I was not aware of it.
You see, it was scarcely strange if I thought Lady Eversleigh and Mr.
Carrington were nearly related; for, when people are very old friends,
they seem like relations: it is only in name that there is any
difference.
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