'It is naturally distressing to find you acting such a part.'
'Then I am afraid you have a good deal to go through in the course of your life. If every little flirtation on the part of your "Geschwister" is to produce this effect, there won't be much left of you by the time it comes to Stella.'
'What meaning do you attach to the words "little flirtation?"'
'When the head of the family puts the question in that solemn tone, how is it to be answered? Bless me, Blunderbore, such a countenance can only proceed from being smitten yourself! To be sure, when there was only one girl you ever spoke to, it was no wonder. Poor old fellow! I'd never have poached on your manor, but how was I to imagine a pillar of the house giving way to such levities?'
'This is mere bravado, Edgar,' was the grave answer, in a tone not disconcerted, but full of repression, and with a pale but steady countenance. 'Gloss it over as you will, a correspondence such as you have begun is unjustifiable. It risks damaging for ever the prospects, at once not only of—of the object—but those of your little sisters.'
'O Felicissimo mio, how green a spot is Bexley! As though secrets and mysteries were not the elixir of life to the boarding-school.'
'Have you ever considered what a discovery must involve?'
'I need not, it seems, since you had not the sense to box that child's ears for a meddlesome tell-tale. Did the scene equal Madame's performance?'
'You do not imagine that I mentioned it.'
'Oh! The revered prop of the state soars so far above my head that I did not know what he might regard as his duty.'