The
first two or three days he saw no one but Mr. Corey, and but for the
women's voices in the other parts of the house, he might have
supposed himself in another bachelor's apartments, finer and grander
than Bellingham's. He was presented to Mrs. Corey when she came into
the library, but he did not see the daughters of the house till he
was installed in it. After that, his acquaintance with them seemed
to go no further. They were all polite and kind when they met him,
in the library or on the stairs, but they showed no curiosity about
him; and his never meeting them at table helped to keep him a
stranger to them under the same roof. He ate at a boarding-house in
a neighbouring street, but he slept at the Coreys' after he had read
their father asleep, and then, going out to his late breakfast, he
did not return till Mr. Corey had eaten his own, much later.
He wondered at first that neither of those young ladies read to
their father, not knowing the disability for mutual help that riches
bring. Later, he saw how much Miss Lily Corey was engrossed with
charity and art, and how constantly Miss Nannie Corey was occupied
with social cares, and was perpetually going and coming in their
performance. Then he saw that they could not have rendered nor their
father have received from his family the duty which he was paid to
do, as they must have done if they had been poorer.
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