Hardinge laughs with her. Not at his friend, but with her. It seems clear to him that Perpetua is making gentle fun of her guardian, and though his conscience smites him for encouraging her in her naughtiness, still he cannot refrain.
"He is an awfully good old fellow," says he, throwing a sop to his
Cerberus.
"Is he?" says Perpetua, as if even more amused. She looks up at him, and then down again, and trifles with the fan she has taken back from him, and finally laughs again; something in her laugh this time, however, puzzles him.
"You don't like him?" hazards he. "After all, I suppose it is hardly natural that a ward should like her guardian."
"Yes? And why?" asks Perpetua, still smiling, still apparently amused.
"For one thing, the sense of restraint that belongs to the relations between them. A guardian, you know, would be able to control one in a measure."
"Would he?"
"Well, I imagine so. It is traditionary. And you?"
"I don't know about other people," says Miss Wynter, calmly, "I know only this, that nobody ever yet controlled me, and I don't suppose now that anybody ever will."
As she says this she looks at him with the prettiest smile; it is a mixture of amusement and defiance. Hardinge, gazing at her, draws conclusions. ("Perfectly hates him," decides he.)