"Pray spare me!" says Miss Knollys, in so cold, so haughty, so commanding a tone, that even Lady Rylton sinks beneath it. She makes an effort to sustain her position and laughs lightly, but for all that she lets her last sentence remain a fragment.
"You think Maurice will propose to this Miss Bolton?" says Marian
Bethune, leaning forward. There is something sarcastic in her smile.
"He must. It is detestable, of course. One would like a girl in his own rank, but there are so few of them with money, and when there is one, her people want her to marry a Duke or a foreign Prince—so tiresome of them!"
"It is all such folly," says Margaret, knitting her brows.
"Utter folly," says Lady Rylton. "That is what makes it so wise! It would be folly to marry a satyr—satyrs are horrid—but if the satyr had millions! Oh, the wisdom of it!"
"You go too far!" says Margaret. "Money is not everything."
"And Maurice is not a satyr," says Mrs. Bethune, a trifle unwisely. She has been watching the players on the ground below. Lady Rylton looks at her.
"Of course you object to it," says she.
"I!" says Marian. "Why should I object to it? I talk of marriage only in the abstract."
"I am glad of that!" Lady Rylton's eyes are still fixed on hers. "This will be a veritable marriage, I assure you; I have set my mind on it. It is terrible to contemplate, but one must give way sometimes; yet the thought of throwing that girl into the arms of darling Maurice——"