"You couldn't have loved him, Georgiana."
"Loved him! Who thinks about love nowadays? I don't know any one who loves any one else. You won't tell me that Sophy is going to marry that idiot because she loves him! Did Julia Triplex love that man with the large fortune? When you wanted Dolly to marry Marie Melmotte you never thought of his loving her. I had got the better of all that kind of thing before I was twenty."
"I think a young woman should love her husband."
"It makes me sick, mamma, to hear you talk in that way. It does indeed. When one has been going on for a dozen years trying to do something,—and I have never had any secrets from you,—then that you should turn round upon me and talk about love! Mamma, if you would help me I think I could still manage with Mr. Brehgert." Lady Pomona shuddered. "You have not got to marry him."
"It is too horrid."
"Who would have to put up with it? Not you, or papa, or Dolly. I should have a house of my own at least, and I should know what I had to expect for the rest of my life. If I stay here I shall go mad,—or die."
"It is impossible."
"If you will stand to me, mamma, I am sure it may be done. I would write to him, and say that you would see him."
"Georgiana, I will never see him."
"Why not?"