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whole year," she said with conviction. "Oh dear, dear," said Lady Rose, rising as gracefully as a guardian angel from her _prie-dieu_. Molly made no comment, although in her heart she was very angry with Mrs. Delaport Green. Her quick "Good-night" was very cordially returned by the other two. "Now tell me something more about Miss Molly Dexter," said Rose, sinking on to a tiny footstool at Lady Groombridge's feet as soon as they were alone. "I am ashamed to say that I know very little about her; I am simply furious with myself for having asked them at all. I don't often yield to kind-hearted impulses, and I'm sure I'm punished enough this time." Lady Groombridge gave a snort. "But who is she? Is she one of the Malcot Dexters?" "Yes; I can tell you that much. She is the daughter of a John Dexter I used to know a little. He died many years ago, not very long after divorcing his wife, and this poor girl was brought up by an aunt, and Sir Edmund says she had a bad time of it. Then she made one of those odd arrangements people make nowadays, to be taken about by this Mrs. Delaport Green, and I met them at Aunt Emily's, and, of course, I thought they were all right and asked them to come here. After that I heard a little more about the girl from some one in London; I can't remember who it was now." "Poor thing," said Rose; "she looks as if she had had a sad childhood. But what curious eyes; I find her looking through and through me." "Yes; you have evidently got a marked attraction for her." "Repulsion, I should have called it," said Rose, with her gentle laugh. Lady Groombridge laughed too, and got up to go to bed. "And what became of the mother?" "She is living--" said the other; then she caught her sleeve in the table very clumsily, and was a moment or two disengaging the lace. "She is living," she then said rather slowly, "in Paris, I think it is, but this girl has never seen her." "How dreadful!" "Yes. Good-night, Rose; do get to bed quickly,--a wise remark when it is I who have been keeping you up!" Lady Groombridge, when she got to her own room, murmured to herself: "I only stopped just in time. I nearly said Florence, and that is where the other wicked woman lives. It's odd they should both live in Florence. But--how absurd, I'm half asleep--it would be much odder if there were not two wicked women in Florence." Sir Edmund was aware as soon as he took his seat by Molly at th
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