In the meantime Guss Mildmay made her complaints, deep but not loud. She and Mrs. Houghton had been very intimate as girls, knew
each other's secrets, and understood each other's characters. "Why did you have him to such a party as this?" said Guss.
"I told you he was coming."
"But you didn't tell me about that young woman. You put him next to her on purpose to annoy me."
"That's nonsense. You know as well as I do that nothing can come of it. You must drop it, and you'd better do it at once. You don't want to be known as the girl who is dying for the love of a man she can't marry. That's not your métier."
"That's my own affair. If I choose to stick to him you, at least, ought not to cross me."
"But he won't stick to you. Of course he's my cousin, and I don't see why he's to be supposed never to say a word to anyone else, when it's quite understood that you're not going to have one another. What's the good of being a dog in the manger?"
"Adelaide, you never had any heart!"
"Of course not;—or, if I had, I knew how to get the better of so troublesome an appendage. I hate hearing about hearts. If he'd take you to-morrow you wouldn't marry him?"
"Yes, I would."