"You are not angry with me, Barbara?" asks the girl, loosening her sister's arms the better to see her face.
"Angry! No, how could I be angry?" says Mrs. Monkton, the more vehemently in that she knows she had been very angry just at first. "It was the merest chance. It might have happened to anybody. One can't control storms!"
"No—that's what Mrs. Connolly said, only she called it 'the ilimints,'" says Joyce, with quite a little ghost of a smile.
"Well, now you are home again, and it's all behind you. And there is really nothing in it. And you must not think so much about it," says Barbara, fondling her hand. "Lady Baltimore said you were too unhappy about it."
"Did she say that? What else did she say?" asks the girl, regarding her sister with searching, eyes. What had Lady Baltimore told her? That impulsive admission to the latter last night had been troubling Joyce ever since, and now to have to lay bare her heart again, to acknowledge her seeming fickleness, to receive Barbara's congratulation on it, only to declare that this second lover has, too, been placed by Fate outside her life, seems too bitter to her. Oh, no—she cannot tell Barbara.
"Why nothing," says Mrs. Monkton, who is now busying herself removing the girl's hat and furs. "What was there to tell, after all?" She is plainly determined to treat the matter lightly.
"Oh—there is a good deal," says Joyce, bitterly. "Why don't you tell me," turning suddenly upon her sister, "that you knew how it would be all along? That you distrusted that Mr. Beauclerk from the very first, and that Felix Dysart was always worth a thousand of him?" There is something that is almost defiant in her manner.
"Because, for one thing, I very seldom call him Felix," says Mrs. Monkton, with a smile, alluding to the last accusation. "And because, too, I can't bear the 'I told you so' persons.—You mustn't class me with them, Joyce, whatever you do."
"I shan't be able to do much more, at all events," says Joyce presently. "That's one comfort, not only for myself but for my family. I expect I have excelled myself this time. Well," with a dull little laugh, "it will have to last, so——"
"Joyce," says her sister, quickly, "tell me one small thing. Mr. Beauclerk—he——"