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‘I’m not stupid; but I don’t know anything about mon-
ey.’
‘Yes, that’s the way you were brought up—as if you were
to inherit a million. What have you in point of fact inher-
ited?’
‘I really can’t tell you. You must ask Edmund and Lilian;
they’ll be back in half an hour.’
‘In Florence we should call it a very bad house,’ said Mrs.
Touchett; ‘but here, I dare say, it will bring a high price.
It ought to make a considerable sum for each of you. In
addition to that you must have something else; it’s most ex-
traordinary your not knowing. The position’s of value, and
they’ll probably pull it down and make a row of shops. I
wonder you don’t do that yourself; you might let the shops
to great advantage.’
Isabel stared; the idea of letting shops was new to her. ‘I
hope they won’t pull it down,’ she said; ‘I’m extremely fond
of it.’
‘I don’t see what makes you fond of it; your father died
here.’
‘Yes, but I don’t dislike it for that,’ the girl rather strangely
returned. ‘I like places in which things have happened—
even if they’re sad things. A great many people have died
here; the place has been full of life.’
‘Is that what you call being full of life?’
‘I mean full of experience—of people’s feelings and sor-
rows. And not of their sorrows only, for I’ve been very happy
here as a child.’
‘You should go to Florence if you like houses in which

36 The Portrait of a Lady