“No, I shall not repent it. I will go to my father and mother. I will tell them how bad I have been and ask them to forgive me. I shall never repent that, I know.”
She drew her arm from his clasp and, without lifting her eyes to him, went forward with a swift, purposeful step. He watched her a few moments, and then with a dark countenance turned homeward. “This is Elizabeth’s doing,” he muttered. “Elizabeth is too, too detestably respectable for anything. I saw and felt her sugared patronage of Denas through all her soft phrases; she treats me in the same way sometimes. When women get a husband they are conceited enough, but when they get a husband and money also they are––the devil only knows what they are.”
He entered Elizabeth’s presence very sulkily. Robert was in London and there was no reason why he should keep his temper in the background. “There is Caroline’s answer,” he said, throwing a letter on the table, “and I do wish, Elizabeth, you would send me pleasanter errands in the future. Caroline kept me waiting until she returned from a lunch at Colonel Prynne’s. And then she hurried me away because there was to be a grand dinner-party at the Pullens’.”
“At the Pullens’? It is very strange Robert and I were not invited.”
“I should say very strange indeed, seeing that Caroline is their guest. But Lord and Lady Avonmere were to be present, and of course they did not want any of us.”
“Any of us? Pray, why not?”
“Father’s bankruptcy is not forgotten. We were nobodies until you married Robert Burrell, and even Robert’s money is all trade money.”
“You are purposely trying to say disagreeable things, Roland. What fresh snub has Caroline been giving you?”
“Snubs are common to all. Big people are snubbed by lesser people, and these by still smaller ones, and so ad infinitum. You are a bit bigger than Denas, so you snub her, and Denas, of course, passes on the snub. Why should she not? Where is Denas?”