He made his daughter Eleanor into his chief confidante, and the prime of her life was being rapidly consumed by her father.

To her he dictated the memoirs which were to avenge his memory, and she had to assure him constantly that his treatment had been a disgrace.

Already, at the age of thirty-five, her cheeks were whitening as her mother's had whitened, but for her there would be no memories of Indian suns and Indian rivers, and clamor of children in a nursery; she would have very little of substance to think about when she sat, as Lady Otway now sat, knitting white wool, with her eyes fixed almost perpetually upon the same embroidered bird upon the same fire-screen.
But then Lady Otway was one of the people for whom the great make-believe game of English social life has been invented; she spent most of her time in pretending to herself and her neighbors that she was a dignified, important, much-occupied person, of considerable social standing and sufficient wealth.

In view of the actual state of things this game needed a great deal of skill; and, perhaps, at the age she had reached--she was over sixty--she played far more to deceive herself than to deceive any one else.

Moreover, the armor was wearing thin; she forgot to keep up appearances more and more.
The worn patches in the carpets, and the pallor of the drawing-room, where no chair or cover had been renewed for some years, were due not only to the miserable pension, but to the wear and tear of twelve children, eight of whom were sons.