'My dear, you will get all your thanks in one day,' he said dryly. 'I know the class you have to deal with. They'll take all you have to give them, and laugh in your face. They have no such quality as gratitude in them.'
Gladys curled her lips in scorn.
'How unhappy you must be to have so little faith in humankind. That has not been my experience; but we shall never agree on that point. Shall we go up-stairs now?'
Her perfect independence of and indifference to his opinion, betrayed in the careless ease of her manner as she rose from the hearth, exasperated him not a little.
'No, I am not coming up-stairs,' he answered, as rudely as he dared.
'What shall I say to Mrs. Fordyce, then? That you are out of temper?' she asked, with a sly gaiety which became her well, though it only further exasperated him.
'You can say anything you like, I am very sorry indeed that my opinion is of so little value in your eyes, Gladys, and I ask your pardon if I have presumed too much in offering you a crumb of advice.'
'Oh, don't be cross because we don't happen to agree on that particular point,' she said sunnily. 'Each individual is surely entitled to his opinion. I am not cross because you would not agree with me. Come away up-stairs.'
'No, I'm not coming up to-night. Make my apologies to them. Gladys, upon my word, you are perfectly bewitching. I wish you knew how passionately I love you. I don't believe you care a tithe as much for me as I do for you.'
He would have held her again, but she moved away from him, and her face did not brighten as it ought to have done at such a lover-like speech.