e are plenty of neighbours all around?"

"That is true, but I don't believe you'll care for them, nor they for
you: they are the Lorrimer sort, and the Miss Macalister sort, and the
Hester Thornton sort. You know you don't care for those sorts of
people, do you?"

"I'm sure I don't. I hate them. I wish father hadn't bought the Towers
without consulting me."

"Can't he back out of it?"

"Back out of his bargain? What do you mean?"

"I mean what I say; can't he get out of it? The Towers isn't a bit the
sort of place for you; it isn't even healthy for a girl like you.
There's a ghost there, and ground damp, and bad water, and the
neighbours aren't sociable, and you'll be moped to death."

"How perfectly miserable you make me, Tony, but I won't be quite
friendless, for you'll be here most of the time now, won't you?"

"Not I; I am going back to my atelier in Paris. Do you think I'd live in
a poky corner of the world like this?"

"What shall I do?" echoed Susy. "I think you're very unkind to make me
so wretched and to depress me in the way you are doing. The Towers is
bought now, and we must make the best of it."

"I only hope you won't suffer the consequences of this piece of folly,"
retorted Antonia with spirit. "The Towers is not the place for you, and
you ought to persuade your father to get out of that bargain. Let him
take a nice cheerful villa at Richmond; that's where you ought to live."

"I wish he would," said Susy; "but it's a great deal too late, a great
deal too late to draw back now. Besides, we did so want to be county
people."

"You'll never be county people, whatever that jargon means--that is,
you'll never be like the Lorrimers and the Thorntons. You don't want to
be, do you?"

"Good gracious, no; they are a depressing set."

"Then that's what county people are, so why should you kill yourself to
be one of them? Aren't you going to write to your father to tell him
what you think of the Towers?"

"Shall I?"

"I would if I were you. You might suggest----"

"Yes; do you think it would be any use?"

"There is no saying--it's your own affair. If you choose to die of
_ennui_, don't tell me that I haven't warned you. Now I see you are wide
awake, so you may dry your hair and get up."

"Oh, dear, oh, dear," sighed Susy after Antonia had swung herself out of
the room, "I'm chilled to the bone and every scrap of spirit taken out
of me. I hate that awful Towers--_why_ did father buy it?"

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