“I see it, thank you,” said Pete.
“Really, Mr. Wayne, I don’t think that’s quite the tone to take,” put in Adelaide.
“I don’t think it is,” said Wayne.
Mathilde, making one last grasp at self-control, said:
“They wouldn’t be so horrid to you, Pete, if they understood—” But the muscles of her throat contracted, and she never got any further.
“I suppose I shall be thought a very cruel parent,” said Adelaide, almost airily, “but this sort of thing can’t go on, really, you know.”
“No, it really can’t,” said Mr. Lanley. “We feel you have abused our confidence.”
“No, I don’t reproach Mr. Wayne along those lines,” said Adelaide. “He owes me nothing. I had not supposed Mathilde would deceive me, but we won’t discuss that now. It isn’t anything against Mr. Wayne to say he has made a mistake. Five years from now, I’m sure, he would not put himself, or let himself be put, in such an extremely humiliating position. And I don’t say that if he came back five years from now with some financial standing I should be any more opposed to him than to any one else. Only in the meantime there can be no engagement.” Adelaide looked very reasonable. “You must see that.”
“You mean I’m not to see him?”
“Of course not.”