"Yours, dear!" said Cecilia, smiling.
"He is not! Why, he is—nobody!"
"Well, that's not his fault. He wants to be somebody! He is doing his best to marry into our family, love!"
At that Rosamund had to laugh. "Oh, Cissy! Don't be such a goose! Mr. Flood is perfectly odious to me, and you know it. I don't see why you ever let Marshall introduce him! I don't see why you ever allowed him to so much as dare to invite us to Oakleigh!"
"But, my dear, Oakleigh is—Oakleigh!"
"What if it is? He ought to have known better than to ask us there, and I don't see why you accepted."
Mrs. Maxwell smiled. "Pity, my dear!" she explained. "Pity—the crumb to a starving dog—the farthing to a beggar! Besides, he will let me invite whom I please and—well, Benson Flood may be a suppliant for one thing, Rose, but he has, after all, more money than he can count!"
"Then why don't you marry him yourself?"
Mrs. Maxwell shrugged. "'Nobody asked me, sir, she said!' And besides, when poor dear Tommy died—oh, well, he did actually die, poor darling, so there never was any question of divorce or anything horrid, like that—you know how old-fashioned I am in my ideas, Rosamund! But still, there is such a thing as tempting Providence a little too often. My hopes are distinctly not matrimonial. Not that I think Mr. Flood is the least bit like Tommy. If I did, of course I couldn't conscientiously—you know! As it is, I think he'd do very well—in the family!"
"You show great respect for the family!"