"I shouldn't have said that, perhaps," says she, sending a little tremulous glance at her husband from behind the urn. "But I couldn't help it. I can't bear to hear you say you would like to be like him."
She smiles (a little, gentle, "don't-be-angry-with-me" smile, scarcely to be resisted by any man, and certainly not by her husband, who adores her). It is scarcely necessary to record this last fact, as all who run may read it for themselves, but it saves time to put it in black and white.
"But why not, my dear?" says Mr. Monkton, magisterially. "Surely, considering all things, you have reason to be deeply grateful to Sir George. Why, then, abuse him?"
"Grateful! To Sir George! To your father!" cries his wife, hotly and quick, and——
"Freddy!" from his sister-in-law brings him to a full stop for a moment.
"Do you mean to tell me," says he, thus brought to bay, "that you have nothing to thank Sir George for?" He is addressing his wife.
"Nothing, nothing!" declares she, vehemently, the remembrance of that last letter from her husband's father, that still lies within reach of her view, lending a suspicion of passion to her voice.
"Oh, my dear girl, consider!" says Mr. Monkton, lively reproach in his tone. "Has he not given you me, the best husband in Europe?"
"Ah, what it is to be modest," says Joyce, with her little quick brilliant laugh.
"Well, it's not true," says Mrs. Monkton, who has laughed also, in spite of herself and the soreness at her heart. "He did not give you to me. You made me that gift of your own free will. I have, as I said before, nothing to thank him for."