"Of course not! Florence never does wrong in your eyes. It is a pity every one else does not regard her as favorably as you do."
"I think every one thinks very highly of her," angrily.
"Do you? It probably pleases you to think so. I, for one, do not."
"There is a certain class of people whose likes and dislikes cannot possibly be accounted for," says Guy, somewhat bitterly. "I think you would find a difficulty in explaining to me your vehement antipathy toward Miss Beauchamp. You should remember 'unfounded prejudices bear no weight.'"
"That sounds like one of Miss Beauchamp's own trite remarks," says Lilian, with a disagreeable laugh. "Did you learn it from her?"
To this Chetwoode makes no reply, and Lilian, carried away by resentment at his open support of Florence, and by his determination not to accede to her request about young Heskett, says, passionately:
"Why should you lose your temper about it?" (it is her own temper that has gone astray). "It is all not worth a quarrel. Any one may plainly see how hateful I am to you. In a thousand ways you show me how badly you think of me. You are a petty tyrant. If I could leave your house, where I feel myself unwelcome,—at least as far as you are concerned,—I would gladly do so."
Here she stops, more from want of breath than eloquence.
"Be silent," says Guy, turning to confront her, and thereby showing a face as pale as hers is flushed with childish rage and bafflement. "How dare you speak like that!" Then, changing his tone, he says quietly, "You are wrong; you altogether mistake. I am no tyrant; I do what is just according to my own conscience. No man can do more. As to what else you may have said, it is impossible you can feel yourself unwelcome in my house. I do not believe you feel it."
"Thank you," still defiant, though in truth she is a little frightened by his manner: "that is as much as to say I am telling a lie, but I do believe it all the same. Every day you thwart and disappoint me in one way or another, and you know it."