Chapter XV

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Mrs. Melrose's face fell, and she looked at Susy with the plaintive bewilderment of the wielder of millions to whom everything that cannot be bought is imperceptible.

"But I can't see why you can't change your plans," she murmured with a soft persistency.

"Ah, well, you know"--Susy paused on a slow inward smile-- "they're not mine only, as it happens."

Mrs. Melrose's brow clouded. The unforeseen complication of Mrs. Fulmer's presence on the journey had evidently tried her nerves, and this new obstacle to her arrangements shook her faith in the divine order of things.

"Your plans are not yours only? But surely you won't let Ursula Gillow dictate to you? ... There's my jade pendant; the one you said you liked the other day .... The Fulmers won't go with me, you understand, unless they're satisfied about the children; the whole plan will fall through. Susy darling, you were always too unselfish; I hate to see you sacrificed to Ursula."

Susy's smile lingered. Time was when she might have been glad to add the jade pendant to the collection already enriched by Ellie Vanderlyn's sapphires; more recently, she would have resented the offer as an insult to her newly-found principles. But already the mere fact that she might henceforth, if she chose, be utterly out of reach of such bribes, enabled her to look down on them with tolerance. Oh, the blessed moral freedom that wealth conferred! She recalled Mrs. Fulmer's uncontrollable cry: "The most wonderful thing of all is not having to contrive and skimp, and give up something every single minute!" Yes; it was only on such terms that one could call one's soul one's own. The sense of it gave Susy the grace to answer amicably: "If I could possibly help you out, Violet, I shouldn't want a present to persuade me. And, as you say, there's no reason why I should sacrifice myself to Ursula--or to anybody else. Only, as it happens"--she paused and took the plunge--"I'm going to England because I've promised to see a friend." That night she wrote to Strefford.