Roly also is on my side, and comes upstairs to tell me so.
"You have twice the spirit, you know," he says, in a tone meant to compliment. "Dora is too dead-and-alive; no man born would be tormented with her. I am awfully glad, Phyllis."
And then he speaks of poor "Dora," and a moment later goes into convulsions of laughter over "poor Dora's" discomfiture.
"She made so sure, don't you know, and that; had upset and re-arranged Strangemore and Carrington and everything to her own entire satisfaction. Oh, by Jove, it is the best joke I ever heard in my life!" And so on.
When by chance during the evening papa and I meet, though his manner is frozen, he makes no offensive remarks; and, strange as it appears to me, I seem to have gained some dignity in his eyes. So the long hours of that day drag by, and night falls at last.
After dinner Dora comes creeping in, her eyelids red and swollen, her dainty cheeks bereft of their usual soft pink. Misery and despair are depicted in every line of her face and figure.
Papa rises ostentatiously and pushes an easy chair towards the fire for her (already the touch of winter is upon us.) Mamma pours out a glass of papa's own port. Even Billy proclaims a truce for the time being, and places a soft stool beneath my injured sister's feet, while I sit apart and feel myself a murderess.
I begin to vaguely wonder whether, were I in Dora's place, all these delicate attentions would be showered upon me. I also try to decide whether, if I had been slighted by my beloved, I would publish the fact upon the house-tops and come down to the bosom of my family with scarlet eyes and pallid face and hair effectively loosened: or whether I would hide my sorrow with my life and endure all in heroic silence. I have got so far as the Spartan boy in my meditations, when Roland, bringing his fingers to meet upon the fleshy part of my arm, causes me to spring from my seat and give utterance to an emphatic "Oh!" while Cheekie, the fox-terrier, who is crouching in her favorite position at my feet, coming in for a full share of my weight, sets up a corresponding howl, and altogether the confusion is complete.
When it has subsided there ensues an awful pause. Then papa speaks.
"It would be waste of time to appeal to your better feelings, Phyllis: you have none! But that you are hopelessly wanting in all delicacy of sentiment, you would understand that this is no time to indulge in a vulgar overflow of spirits. Do you not see how your sister is suffering? Your heartlessness is downright disgusting. Leave the room."