This glimpse of a misconception led her to be
explicit--to put before the child, with an air of mourning indeed for
such a stoop to the common, that what they talked about in the small
hours, as they said, was the question of his taking right hold of life.
The life she wanted him to take right hold of was the public: "she"
being, I hasten to add, in this connexion, not the mistress of his fate,
but only Mrs. Wix herself. She had phrases about him that were full of
easy understanding, yet full of morality. "He's a wonderful nature, but
he can't live like the lilies. He's all right, you know, but he must
have a high interest." She had more than once remarked that his affairs
were sadly involved, but that they must get him--Maisie and she
together apparently--into Parliament. The child took it from her with a
flutter of importance that Parliament was his natural sphere, and she
was the less prepared to recognise a hindrance as she had never heard
of any affairs whatever that were not involved. She had in the old
days once been told by Mrs. Beale that her very own were, and with the
refreshment of knowing that she HAD affairs the information hadn't in
the least overwhelmed her. It was true and perhaps a little alarming
that she had never heard of any such matters since then. Full of
charm at any rate was the prospect of some day getting Sir Claude in;
especially after Mrs. Wix, as the fruit of more midnight colloquies,
once went so far as to observe that she really believed it was all
that was wanted to save him.
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