I went beyond my sphere, and I am punished." And when Raymond Deyncourt finally disappeared in America for the last time, having been fished up therefrom on several occasions, each time in worse case than the last, she excommunicated him, and cheerfully altered her will, dividing the sixty thousand pounds she had it in her power to leave, between her two granddaughters, and letting the fact become known, with the result that Anna was married by the end of her second season; and if at the end of five seasons Ruth was still unmarried, she had, as Lady Deyncourt took care to inform people, no one to thank for it but herself.
But in reality, now that Anna was provided for, Lady Deyncourt was in no hurry to part with Ruth.

She liked her as much as it was possible for her to like any one--indeed, I think she even loved her in a way.

She had taken but small notice of her while she was in the school-room, for she cared little about girls as a rule; but as she grew up tall, erect, with the pale, stately beauty of a lily, Lady Deyncourt's heart went out to her.

None of her own daughters had been so distinguished-looking, so ornamental.

Ruth's clothes always looked well on her, and she had a knack of entertaining people, and much taste in the arrangement of flowers.