"Well, sir!"
"I do not love you."
"What! But you are laughing at me. You have some scheme or some plot going on."
"I have nothing going on. It is better to say it. I love my wife."
"Psha! love her;—yes, as you would a doll or any pretty plaything. I loved her too till she took it into her stupid head to quarrel with me. I don't grudge her such love as that. She is a child."
It occurred to Lord George at the moment that his wife had certainly more than an infantine will of her own. "You don't know her," he said.
"And now, after all, you tell me to my face that you do not love me! Why have you sworn so often that you did?" He hadn't sworn it often. He had never sworn it at all since she had rejected him. He had been induced to admit a passion in the most meagre terms. "Do you own yourself to be false?" she asked.
"I am true to my wife."
"Your wife! One would think you were the curate of the parish. And is that to be all?"
"Yes, Mrs. Houghton; that had better be all."