"Such brazen indifference I've never seen."
"And they've actually found the dagger with which he murdered the wretched man."
"Brrr! it makes me feel quite creepy."
"Yes, he was at your At Home, dear, wasn't he? a week ago."
"Oh! one had to ask him for form's sake, you know."
"Poor Lord Radclyffe, what a terrible blow for him."
"They say he'll never recover his speech or the use of his limbs."
"Silence there!"
The cackling herd of geese stopped its whisperings, astonished at being thus reproved. Louisa again felt that irrepressible desire to laugh, they were so funny, she thought, so irresponsible! these people who had come to gape at Luke.
Now they were silent and orderly at the bidding of authority. An old woman, with black bonnet and rusty jacket, was munching sandwiches in a corner seat: a young man at the farther end of the room was sharpening a lead-pencil.