“No great matter, I'll be bound. 'Toll, toll the bell.' Here goes one more immortal friendship—quenched in eternal silence.”
Both ladies bridled. Neither spoke.
“And dead silence, as ladies understand it, consists in speaking at one another instead of to.”
No reply.
“That is well-bred taciturnity.”
No answer.
“The dignified reserve that distinguishes an estrangement from a squabble.”
No reply.
“Well, I admire permanent sentiments, good or bad; constant resolves, etc. Your friendship has not proved immortal; so, now let us see how long you can hold spite—SIEVES!” Then he affected to start. “What is this? I spy a rational creature out on yonder balcony. I hasten to join him. 'Birds of a feather, you know;” and with that he went out to his favorite, 'and never looked behind him.
The young ladies, indignant at the contempt the big man had presumed to cast upon the constant soul of woman, turned two red faces and four sparkling eyes to each other, with the instinctive sympathy of the jointly injured; but remembering in time, turned sharply round again, and presented napes, and so sat sullen.