“But he came to please Aspatria,” continued Lady Redware. “He said he came only to please Aspatria.”
“So Aspatria wishes me to leave Allerdale? I will not go.”
“Sarah, he will not go,” cried Lady 167 Redware, as her friend entered the room. “He says he will not go.”
“That is because you have appealed to Ulfar’s feelings instead of to his judgment. When Ulfar considers how savagely primitive these dalesmen are in their passions, he will understand that discretion is the nobler part of valour. In Russia he thought it a very prudent thing to get out of the way when a pack of wolves were in the neighbourhood.”
“The law will protect me in this house. Human beings have to mind the law.”
“There are times when human beings are a law unto themselves. How would you like to see a crowd of angry men shouting around this house for you? Think of your sister,—and of me, if I am worth so much consideration.”
“I am not to be frightened, Sarah.”
“Will you consider, then, that as far as Keswick and Kendal on one side, and as far as Dalton and Whitehaven on the other side, every local newspaper will have, or will make, its own version of the affair? 168 The Earl of Lonsdale, with a large party, is now at Whitehaven Castle. What a sauce piquante it will be to his dinners! How the men will howl over it, and how the women will snicker and smile!”