"I know what it means, but now is not the appropriate time to define it," Henriettawhispered through her teeth. In a motion I suppose was meant to be subtle, she jerked her head towards me, proving she at least remembered I was here.
"Why? Do you think she doesn't know what it means either?"
"Of course she knows what it means. Everyone who isn't an idiot knows what it means."
"Don't call me an idiot! Mother said you were not to call me an idiot anymore!"
"I didn't call you an idiot. Not specifically."
In reply Belinda pressed her lips into a pout and blew out with all her might, making an offensive sound.
"Oh, how very clever. What a lovely first impression," Henrietta scolded, turning her attention to me she said, "Whatever you might think of her, I assure you that I'm not a heathen. Perhaps you will find it in your heart to keep me at least."
"Cousin Will likes us. He won't send us away. It doesn't matter what she says anyway. And even if she could send us away, I wouldn't mind. I want to go home."
With the false patience of someone who has explained something at least a thousand times, Henrietta said, "There is no home to go to. Father sold Clare Hall to the Tafts."
"IhateFather and Ihatethe Tafts and Ihatetown. It is so dull here."
"You will be going to Pemberley in the summer, I expect. Summer is not so very far away." As soon as I had spoken I realized it was a stupid thing to say. Seven months is practically an eternity to a child.
Belinda looked at me exasperatedly and then rolled her eyes. I had yet to see any family resemblance between the child and my husband, but there it was; she rolls her eyes just like Mr. Darcy.
Sullenly Belinda said,"We won't be going to Pemberley."
"Mother likes town. She doesn't want to go to Derbyshire where there is nothing to do," Henrietta explained.
"Mother doesn't do anything here. She just doesn't want to go to Pemberley because then all those people who knew her when she was young would find out about Father's scandal. People talk about her here, but if the vicar and the housekeeper and her old nurse—think about how much Mother talks about Nanny Higgins! She couldn't bear it ifthosepeople knew what Father had done," said Belinda with the authority of someone much older. The look on Henrietta's face told me her younger sister's sudden display of perspicacity was not normal.
Belinda continued to speak with growing despair, "So she is going to hide in London like a coward and we are going to hide away with her until we are old enough to marry. As soon as I make my come out I am going to marry a Scotsman so I never have to go to town again."
"How would marrying a Scot keep you from coming to town?" asked Henrietta.
"He will take me into the wilds and we will never come out again. They don't have cities in Scotland."
"Really? What about Edinburgh, Inverness—"
"I mean horrid gigantic endless cities like London."
Henrietta heedlessly continued, "Aberdeen, Glasgow, Dundee—"
"I will only marry a man who refuses to step foot in London."
"How are you going to meet him if he never comes to town?"
Apparently out of witty replies, Belinda once again resorted to making a rude sound.
"Don't judge me by her, I'm very civilized," said Henrietta.
She stepped closer as to better observe the book I held, then said, "I see you are readingA Sicilian Romance. It's my favorite. I've read all of Mrs. Radcliffe's novels."
"She's always reading. She knows all sorts of obnoxiously large words and is forever throwing them about to make herself seem clever."
"Iamclever. Cousin Will said so."
"Oh yes, if your darling Will said it it must be true." To me she said, "She wanted to marry him. But you got there first."
"I did not want to marry him," said Henrietta, face darkening very quickly to an alarming shade of red.
