“Why do you say that, Nelly? He comes here very seldom, except on Sunday; and that is a regular thing, just as your coming is.”
“He was here on Tuesday; you saw him at Mrs. Saunders’s on Wednesday; he was at your at-home on Thursday; and he sends a bouquet on Saturday.”
“I cannot help meeting him out; and not to invite him to my at-home would be to cut him. Pray are you growing spiteful, like Mrs. Leith Fairfax?”
“Marian: you got out of bed at the wrong side this morning; and you have made that mistake oftener since your return from Sark than in all your life before. Douglas has become a lazy good-for-nothing; and he comes here a great deal too often. Instead of encouraging him to dangle after you as he does, and to teach you all those finely turned sentiments about love which you were airing a minute ago, you ought to make him get called to the bar, or sent into Parliament, or put to work in some fashion.”
“Nelly!”
“Bother Nelly! It is true; and you know it as well as I do.”
“If he fancies himself in love with me, I cannot help it.”
“You can help his following you about.”
“I cannot. He does not follow me about. Why does not Ned object? He knows that Sholto is in love with me; and he does not care.”
“Oh, if it is only to make Ned jealous, then I have nothing more to say: you may flirt away as hard as you please. There’s a knock at the door, just in time to prevent us from quarrelling. I know whose knock it is, too.”