‘Oh, words! What are words?’ says Mrs. Prior. ‘Deeds count, not words. And all our world knows how attentive he has been to my poor child for years.’
This is a slip, and she is at once conscious of it.
‘Years! Bad sign,’ says Crosby, stroking his chin.
‘I don’t know what you mean by that’—irritably, and with a view to retrieving her position. ‘The longer the time, the greater the injustice—the injury—afterwards. I feel that my poor darling is quite compromised over this affair. I need hardly tell you, George, who know her, and how attractive she is’—Crosby nods feelingly, and, I hope, offers up a prayer for pardon—‘that she has refused many and many a magnificent offer because she believed herself pledged surely, if unspokenly, to her cousin. Her great attachment to him’—all at once Crosby sees Josephine’s calm, calculating eyes and passionless manner—‘has been, I now begin to fear, the misfortune of her life, because certainly—yes, certainly—he led her to believe all along that he meant to make her his wife.’
‘Well, perhaps he does,’ says Crosby.
‘What! And do you imagine I would submit to—to—that establishment, whilst my daughter——’ She buries her face in her handkerchief. ‘Shangarry will be so grieved,’ says she.
This is a second threat, meant to be conveyed to Wyndham. Crosby represses an inclination to laugh. After all, she has chosen, poor woman! about the worst man in Europe for her ambassador. To him, Mrs. Prior’s indignation is as clear as day. With his clear common-sense he thus reads her: She has doubts about Wyndham’s relations with his pretty tenant, but she has deliberately set herself to believe the worst. The worst to her, however, would not be the immoral attitude of the case, but the dread that the girl would inveigle Wyndham into a marriage with her, and so spoil her daughter’s chance. The girl, as she saw her through the spreading branches, was very beautiful, and Josephine—well, there was a time when she was younger, fresher.
‘I really think, Mrs. Prior, you are making a mountain out of a mole-hill,’ says he presently. ‘I assure you I think this young lady, now living in the Cottage, is nothing more or less than Wyndham’s tenant. Why make a fuss about it? I am sure if you ask Wyndham——By-the-by, why don’t you ask him?’
‘Because he refuses me the opportunity,’ says Mrs. Prior. ‘I sent for him; he was not to be found. He purposely avoids me this evening. But he shall not do so to-morrow. I am his aunt; I have every right to speak to him on this disgraceful subject.’
‘Not disgraceful, I trust,’ says Crosby, who is devoutly thanking his stars that Mrs. Prior is not his aunt.