Really, Mater, I ought to have been consulted before.
Lady Twombley.
I know, Brooke, but I couldn’t face my boy’s reproaches.
Brooke Twombley.
Pa must have been inexcusably reckless—what?
Lady Twombley.
No, it’s all my fault, every bit of it. [A pretty melody on the harp is heard.] Brooke, never marry a country-bred girl as your pa did. When he fell in love with me I was content with three frocks a year—think of that!—and had to twist up my own hats. And I could have done it for ever down at Cleverton, but I didn’t stand the transplanting. Oh, I’ll never forget how the fine folks snubbed me and sneered at me when I came to town. Brooke, my son, I declare to goodness that for ten long years I never saw a nose that wasn’t turned up! And then pa got his baronetcy, and old Lady Drumdurris gave us her forefinger to shake, and that did it. But it was too late; I was spoilt by that time. I had been too long fishing for friends with dances, and dinners, and drags, and race-parties, and all sorts of bait; and when the time came for a few people to like me for my own stupid, rough self I’d got into the way of scattering sovereigns as freely as I used to sprinkle mignonette seed in my little garden at the Yale Farm.
Brooke Twombley.
All this is very painful, Mater—what?
Lady Twombley.