"You are too severe with him, Mary. Goodness! how miserable he looked!" And the laughter began again.
But Mary, who had been sitting waiting for an opportunity, now broke out:
"What have I to do with your protégé?"
And as if this were not enough, she bent forward to face Alice's laughing eyes:
"You are confusing me with yourself. It is you who are in love with him. Do you imagine that I have not seen that for ever so long? You know best yourselves in what relation you stand to each other. That is no affair of mine. But the 'De'[B] which you both keep up—is it for the purpose of concealment?"
[B] You as distinguished from the familiar thou.
Alice's laughter ceased. She turned pale, so pale that Mary was alarmed. Mary tried to withdraw her eyes, but could not; Alice's held them fast through painful changes until they lost all expression. Then Alice's head sank back, whilst a long, heavy sigh resembling the groan of a wounded animal escaped her.
Mary sat motionless, aghast at her own speech.
But it was irrevocable.
Alice suddenly raised her head again and told the coachman to stop. "I have a call to make at this house." The carriage stopped; she opened the door, stepped out, and shut it after her.