"Then you had better let him go."
"I will not let him go. What,—to be pointed at as the woman that Lord Fawn had jilted? Never! My necklace should be nothing more to him than this ring." And she drew from her finger a little circlet of gold with a stone, for which she had owed Messrs. Harter and Benjamin five-and-thirty pounds till Sir Florian had settled that account for her. "What cause can he give for such treatment?"
"He acknowledges that there is no cause which he can state openly."
"And I am to bear it? And it is you that tell me so? Oh, Frank!"
"Let us understand each other, Lizzie. I will not fight him,—that is, with pistols; nor will I attempt to thrash him. It would be useless to argue whether public opinion is right or wrong; but public opinion is now so much opposed to that kind of thing, that it is out of the question. I should injure your position and destroy my own. If you mean to quarrel with me on that score, you had better say so."
Perhaps at that moment he almost wished that she would quarrel with him, but she was otherwise disposed. "Oh, Frank," she said, "do not desert me."
"I will not desert you."
"You feel that I am ill-used, Frank?"
"I do. I think that his conduct is inexcusable."
"And there is to be no punishment?" she asked, with that strong indignation at injustice which the unjust always feel when they are injured.