arce, and we may be thankful
to get anything so private. It is not so very bad. There are two little
parlors and four bedrooms. You shall sit alone whenever you like."

The ebb of sympathetic care for her mamma had gone so low just now,
that Gwendolen took no notice of these deprecatory words.

"I cannot conceive that all your property is gone at once, mamma. How
can you be sure in so short a time? It is not a week since you wrote to
me."

"The first news came much earlier, dear. But I would not spoil your
pleasure till it was quite necessary."

"Oh, how vexatious!" said Gwendolen, coloring with fresh anger. "If I
had known, I could have brought home the money I had won: and for want
of knowing, I stayed and lost it. I had nearly two hundred pounds, and
it would have done for us to live on a little while, till I could carry
out some plan." She paused an instant and then added more impetuously,
"Everything has gone against me. People have come near me only to
blight me."

Among the "people" she was including Deronda. If he had not interfered
in her life she would have gone to the gaming-table again with a few
napoleons, and might have won back her losses.

"We must resign ourselves to the will of Providence, my child," said
poor Mrs. Davilow, startled by this revelation of the gambling, but not
daring to say more. She felt sure that "people" meant Grandcourt, about
whom her lips were sealed. And Gwendolen answered immediately--

"But I don't resign myself. I shall do what I can against it. What is
the good of calling the people's wickedness Providence? You said in
your letter it was Mr. Lassman's fault we had lost our money. Has he
run away with it all?"

"No, dear, you don't understand. There were great speculations: he
meant to gain. It was all about mines and things of that sort. He
risked too much."

"I don't call that Providence: it was his improvidence with our money,
and he ought to be punished. Can't we go to law and recover our
fortune? My uncle ought to take measures, and not sit down by such
wrongs. We ought to go to law."

"My dear child, law can never bring back money lost in that way. Your
uncle says it is milk spilled upon the ground. Besides, one must have a
fortune to get any law: there is no law for people who are ruined. And
our money has only gone along with other's people's. We are not the
only sufferers: others have to resign themselves besides us."

"But I don't resign myself to live