"
"Oh, she wouldn't feel THAT way," Louisa observed, vaguely.
"If you ask me plain, I think it was dull for her."
"Well," said Thorpe, upon reflection, "I shouldn't
be surprised if it was. I hadn't thought of that.
But still--why she and my wife could be company for
each other."
"You talk as if life was merely a long railway journey,"
she told him, in an unexpected flight of metaphor.
"Two women cooped up in a lonesome country house may be
a little less lonely than one of them by herself would
be--but not much. It's none of my business--but how your
wife must hate it!"
He laughed easily. "Ah, that's where you're wrong,"
he said. "She doesn't care about anything but gardening.
That's her hobby. She's crazy about it. We've laid out
more in new greenhouses alone, not counting the plants,
than would rebuild this building. I'm not sure the heating
apparatus wouldn't come to that, alone. And then the plants!
What do you think of six and eight guineas for a single
root? Those are the amaryllises--and if you come to orchids,
you can pay hundreds if you like. Well, that's her passion.
That's what she really loves."
"That's what she seizes upon to keep her from just dying
of loneliness," Louisa retorted, obstinately, and at a sign
of dissent from her brother she went on. "Oh, I know what
I'm talking about.
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