"Does anyone ever do anything more than 'cry at first'?" exclaimed Adela.
"Oh, my dear, don't be tragical, or cynical, or whatever you are being," said Maggie pettishly. "Mr. Loring has chosen to be very silly, and there's an end of it. Have you seen the prospectus? Do you know Mr. Ruston brought it to show me before it was submitted to Mr. Belford and the others—the Board, I mean?"
"I think you see quite enough of Mr. Ruston," said Adela, putting up her glass and examining Mrs. Dennison closely. She spoke coolly, but with a nervous knowledge of her presumption.
Mrs. Dennison may have had a taste for diplomacy and the other arts of government, but she was no diplomatist. She thought herself gravely wronged by Adela's suggestion, and burst out angrily,
"Oh, you've been listening to Tom Loring!" and her heightened colour seemed not to agree with the idea that, if Adela had listened, Tom had talked of nothing but Omofaga. "I don't mind it from Berthe," Mrs. Dennison continued, "but from you it's too bad. I suppose he told you the whole thing? I declare I wasn't dreaming of anything of the kind; I was just excited, and——"
"I haven't seen Mr. Loring," put in Adela as soon as she could.
"Then how do you know——?"
"Lord Semingham told me you quarrelled with Mr. Loring about Omofaga."
"Is that all?"
"Yes. Maggie, was there any more?"