"That doesn't matter," says Lady Rodney: "it is a mere formula. If it suited your purpose you could have said so—I don't doubt—readily enough."
"I regret that I met them," says Mona, who will not say she regrets she told the truth.
"And to usher them in here! Into one of my most private rooms! Unlikely people, like the Carsons, whom you have heard me speak of in disparaging terms a hundred times! I don't know what you could have been thinking about. Perhaps next time you will be kind enough to bring them to my bedroom."
"You misunderstand me," says Mona, with tears in her eyes.
"I hardly think so. You can refuse to see people yourself when it suits you. Only yesterday, when Mr. Boer, our rector, called, and I sent for you, you would not come."
"I don't like Mr. Boer," says Mona, "and it was not me he came to see."
"Still, there was no necessity to insult him with such a message as you sent. Perhaps," with unpleasant meaning, "you do not understand that to say you are busy is rather more a rudeness than an excuse for one's non-appearance."
"It was true," says Mona: "I was writing letters for Geoffrey."
"Nevertheless, you might have waived that fact, and sent down word you had a headache."
"But I hadn't a headache," says Mona, bending her large truthful eyes with embarrassing earnestness upon Lady Rodney.