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Lalitha had not noticed before.
    She also used Lalitha’s Christian name, something which her mother would have thought to be an impertinence.
    “Of course, Mrs. Clements,” Lalitha said. “What is it?”
    “I wish you to know,” Mrs. Clements replied, “that I was married to your father!”
    For a moment Lalitha thought she could not have heard right.
    “Married to Papa?” she exclaimed. “It is impossible!”
    “We were married and I was his wife,” Mrs. Clements said
    furiously. “From now on I am Lady Studley.”
    “But when were you married and at which Church?” Lalitha asked.
    “If you know what is best for you you will not ask me too many questions,” Mrs. Clements replied. “You will accept the situation and realise you are my Stepdaughter.”
    “I...I am afraid I do not... believe you,” Lalitha said quietly. “I am writing to my Uncle Ambrose to suggest that I should go and stay with him in Cornwall. He cannot know of my father’s death, otherwise I am certain he would have written to me.”
    “I forbid you to do so!”
    “Forbid?” Lalitha exclaimed in astonishment.
    “I am now your legal guardian,” Mrs. Clements replied, “and you will obey me. You will not communicate with your Uncle or any of your relations. You will stay with me, and make no mistake, I am Mistress in this house!”
    “But that is not right!” Lalitha protested. “Papa has always said that this would be my house if anything happened to him, and the Estate is mine too.”
    “I think you will have some difficulty in proving it,” Mrs. Clements replied and there was something evil in her smile.
    A strange Solicitor appeared, a man whom Lalitha had never seen before.
    He produced a Will written in a shaky hand which might have been her father’s after his accident, or might not.
    He had left everything to “my beloved wife, Gladys Clements,” and nothing to Lalitha.
    She felt that there must be something wrong, but the Solicitor showed her the Will and assured her that it was not only completely legal but her father’s wish.
    There was nothing she could say to him and when he had gone she sat down and wrote to her Uncle as she had intended to do.
    Mrs. Clements, or rather Lady Studley, as she now called herself, caught her going out of the house to take the letter to the post.
    It was then that she beat her for the first time. Beat her until Lalitha cried for mercy and promised, because she had no alternative, that she would not write to her Uncle again.
    It was perhaps because mentally, if unable to do so physically, Lalitha defied the woman who styled herself her Step-mother that she incurred her venom and spite.
    The new Lady Studley was clever enough not to try to associate with the neighbours.
    They learnt gradually of course that she had taken over the house and the Estate, and that she had married Sir John before he’d died. Few, if any, knew who she had been previously.
    The name “Clements” was dropped as if it had never existed.
    Nevertheless it gave Lalitha a shock when she realised that Sophie now called herself “Studley.”
    “You are not my sister!” Lalitha stormed at her, “and my father was not yours, so how can you bear my name?”
    Sophie’s mother had come into the room while Lalitha was speaking.
    “Who says that your father was not Sophie’s also?” she asked.
    She spoke slowly and there was a look in her eyes as if an idea had suddenly come to her.
    “You know he was not,” Lalitha replied. “You only came here a year ago.”
    She realised that her Step-mother was not listening to her and for once she was not being punished for answering back.
    For a year nothing more was said.
    They kept very much to themselves, but Lalitha realised that Lady Studley was squeezing every penny she could out of the Estate.
    There was no question now of farmers being late with their rent or impoverished tenants being allowed any grace.
    The farms were sold off one by one; the cottages went to