It testified to the girl's secret sense of forlornness, to her natural hunger for the ties and relationships other girls possessed in such abundance.
Mrs.Colwood inquired if it was long since she had had news of her cousins.
"Oh, some years!" said Diana, vaguely.

"I remember a letter coming--before we went to the East--and papa reading it.

I know"-- she hesitated--"I know he didn't like Mr.Merton." She stood still a moment, thinking.

The lights and shadows of reviving memory crossed her face, and presently her thought emerged, with very little hint to her companion of the course it had been taking out of sight.
"Papa always thought it a horrid life for them--Aunt Merton and the girls--especially after they gave up their estate and came to live in the town.

But how could they help it?
They must have been very poor.
Fanny"-- she took up the letter--"Fanny says she has come home to learn music and French--that she may earn money by teaching when she goes back.