Wyvis Brand's brow relaxed a little.
"I don't understand your views of friendship: it seems to mean a right to intermeddle with all the affairs of your acquaintances," he said, cuttingly; "but since you are so good as to ask my intentions——"
"If you talk like that, I'll never speak to you again!" cried Janetta, who was not remarkable for her meekness.
Wyvis actually smiled.
"Come," he said, "be friends, Janetta. I assure you I don't mean any harm. You must not be straight-laced. Your pretty friend is no doubt well able to take care of herself."
But he looked down as he said this and knitted his brows.
"She has never had occasion to do it," said Janetta, epigrammatically.
"Then don't you think it is time she learns?"
"You have no right to be her teacher."
"Right! right!" cried Wyvis, impatiently "I am tired of this cuckoo-cry about my rights! I have the right to do what I choose, to get what pleasure out of life I can, to do my best for myself. It is everybody's right, and he is only a hypocrite who denies it."