"Supposed offence, Mr. Wainwright! You adopt the flippant and unbecoming fashion in these matters! I hold it more than a supposed offence that I should find a person installed in my son's lodgings, with the knowledge of my son's friend, whose presence renders mine impossible."
"We will let the phrase pass, Mrs. Derinzy, and come to the facts. Are you sure you are really acquainted with the character and position of the lady in question?"
"Character and position of the lady in question!" echoed Mrs. Derinzy, in an accent of spiteful contempt. "I should think there was little doubt about them; the facts speak pretty plainly for themselves."
"I assure you, nevertheless, and in spite of appearances, the facts do not speak the truth if they impugn the respectability of Miss Stafford--that is the young lady's name." Mrs. Derinzy bowed scornfully. "I can give you an ample and trustworthy assurance on this point, for I am acquainted--I was made acquainted by Paul himself--with every particular of their intimacy, until within a few weeks of the event which led to his illness; and the remainder I have learned partly from inquiries elsewhere, but chiefly from Miss Stafford herself. If you will listen to me, Mrs. Derinzy, I will tell you Miss Stafford's history, so far as I know it, and the whole truth respecting her position with regard to your son. And in order that what I have to say may be more convincing, may have more weight with you, let me tell you in the first place that I never spoke a word to Miss Stafford until yesterday, when I went to her in my fear and trouble about Paul, feeling convinced that from her only could any real assistance be procured."
"Go on," said Mrs. Derinzy, with sullen resignation. "This is a pleasant hearing for a mother; but it is our fate, I suppose. Tell me what you have to tell."
George obeyed her. He recapitulated all that had passed between himself and Paul on the subject of Daisy, from the time when he had accidentally witnessed their meeting in Kensington Gardens, to the last conversation he had held with Paul before he went to Germany. She listened, still sullen, but with interest, until he told her what was Daisy's position in life; and then she interrupted him with the comment for which he had been prepared.
"A milliner's girl! Truly Paul has a gentlemanly taste! And I am to believe she had scruples and made difficulties?"
"You are," returned George, gravely; "for it is true. I do not sympathise with your notions of caste, Mrs. Derinzy--I think I have known more bad men and unscrupulous women of gentle than of plebeian blood--but I understand them. Miss Stafford had scruples, scruples which Paul failed to vanquish--more shame to him for trying--and she made difficulties which he could not surmount. The last and gravest--that which threw him into the fever in which he is now striving and battling for life--was her refusal, her point-blank, uncompromising, positive refusal, to marry him!"
"To marry him!" exclaimed Mrs. Derinzy, starting up from her chair in very undignified surprise and anger. "My son propose to marry a milliner's girl! I won't believe it!"
"You had no difficulty in believing, on no evidence at all, that he had seduced her," continued George, quietly. "Now I can assume the latter is utterly false; the former is distinctly true. You had better be careful how you act towards this young lady, Mrs. Derinzy, for your son loves her--loves her well enough to have been unworldly, and manly enough to implore her to become his wife, and to be stricken well-nigh to death by her refusal, and the sentence of final separation between them pronounced by her. When your son fell down at his club in the fit from which it seemed at first probable he would never rally, he was struck down by a letter from Miss Stafford, in which she told him he should see her no more."